The AI Files:  Book 1: Bespoke
by Concolor44
Summary: Jinx and Wally get an unexpected visitor one evening. He claims to be able to help, but is that really all he has in mind? And what are Edna Mode & Violet Parr up to? The 'T' rating might be a little light. We'll see. Book One of the "A-I" series.
1. Wounded

**Bespoke**

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_A/N: This one just popped into my head in the shower Wednesday night and demanded to be written. As of right now, it is intended to be rather short, probably three chapters. (I know, that's what I said about 'Instinct' and 'Triad', and why the hell am I beginning yet a third unfinished work when I'm trying to get 'Gone Wylde' done? Because my Muse has had too much coffee. Or something. She won't leave me alone.) I'm sure many of you will catch the references, but for those who don't it shouldn't matter._

_The Standard Disclaimer__TM__ applies, as in, I have nothing to do with the Titans, financially, and they have nothing to do with me. (Rats.) The same goes for The Incredibles. Disney and Pixar and DC Comics and Warner and a host of other really lucky people get that privilege. Also, any resemblance between the characters I made up and any real person, living or dead, means that my research was incomplete. Because it sure wasn't intentional._

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**Chapter One**

_* * Tuesday 18 August, 8:20pm * *_

At the first hint of Jinx's low moan, Wally appeared beside her bed. "Jinxy! You're awake! How do you feel?"

She cracked open one bleary pink eye and drilled him with it. "Does that maybe strike you as a possibly-stupid question, Speedo? I'm recuperating from a gunshot. How the hell do you _**think**_ I feel?"

"… Um … like crap?"

"Got it in one. _**So**_ impressed." She repositioned her left arm and grunted in pain.

He dropped to his knees, one hand hovering aimlessly near her, but she bared her teeth and hissed, "Don't touch it!"

"I really think we ought to get you to some kind of doctor before …"

"No."

"Jinx, be reasonable. I could carry you to an out-of-town clinic, they could treat you, and we'd be gone before the local police …"

"No."

"… Pleeeease?"

"Don't you _**dare**_ pull that Puppy-Dog-Pout on me!"

"Dang."

"I'll heal, Wally. I always do."

"… 'Always'? _**What**_ 'always'? You mean you've been shot before?"

She graced him with a tiny grin, and reached up with her good arm to tousle his hair. "You're so cute when you get all naïve and innocent."

"I'm serious, Jinx! That's _**not**_ a minor flesh wound, there, and you lost a lot of blood."

"What I get for goin' straight an' tryin' to help you with your hero-ing."

"Yeah, yeah, no good deed goes unpunished. Like I never heard that before."

"Don't worry your adorable little red head about it, Flashy. I'll be all right. Just need a few days of rest to let my metahuman awesomeness do its thing, and I'll be tossing hexes around again." She yawned, then yawned enormously and grunted again when it pulled on her injured shoulder. "I wouldn't say no to some aspirin, though."

"I've got some generic version of Aleve, but that's all. With my metabolism …"

"Yeah, got it. That'll do."

A brief gust of wind puffed by between one blink and the next, and he was holding out a small, blue pill and a glass of water with a bendy-straw in it. "This way, you don't have to sit up," he explained.

She smiled her thanks and took the capsule, then eased her head back down to the pillow.

"Are you hungry?"

She frowned while thinking it over. "Now that you mention it, I could do with some of your scrambled eggs."

"Comin' right up!"

"You got any of that eight-year-old white cheddar left?"

"You know it."

"Sweet!"

He vanished, his wash pulling a few strands of pink hair across her face. She blew them back out of the way and called out, "And cinnamon toast?"

"Of course," wafted back in from the kitchen.

She sighed and closed her eyes, but was currently much too uncomfortable to drift off again. She tried a trick an old Army Ranger acquaintance of hers had explained to her, concentrating hard on the pain to try to overload the neural circuits and make them shut down for a while, but the throbbing in her fractured scapula wouldn't really let it work. Truth to tell, she was in a lot more pain than she let on to her … her …

_What __is__ he to me?_ she asked herself. This was a question she had been dwelling on for some time now. Initially he was just the first person to ever see a good side to her, and she'd been drawn to his unfailingly cheerful attitude almost against her will. But then, in the fight with the Brotherhood of Evil, taking out the bad guys had sent a weird sort of thrill through her. It was unlike anything she had previously experienced, and she quickly became addicted to the feeling, which she had still yet to put a name on. Wally hadn't _really_ even _**tried**_ to talk her into going into the hero-biz. He just knew she could do better than being a H.I.V.E. flunky, and helped her to see that. Now, though, over the last four months, with them living in such close proximity, she knew he had become so much more to her. And it wasn't just one-way, either. She was no one's idea of stupid, and she'd picked up on his interest early in their association.

They had a 'unique' relationship, that was for sure. She warned him that she wasn't trustworthy; he trusted her anyway, even telling her his secret identity. She warned him that she might blow up his apartment with an accidental hex; he gave her the guest room anyway, and simply repaired whatever she demolished. She warned him to keep her away from the kitchen, and that she could burn a pot of water; he encouraged her to experiment, ate her cooking anyway … and stocked up on Pepto Bismol.

And now? Now she just didn't feel complete if she couldn't accompany him on his patrols. Now … Keystone City felt like home. His apartment felt like home. Being with him, being a part of his life …

_How big a part?_ she wondered. For at least a month, she'd been catching herself staring at him, her eyes tracing the hard outlines of his muscles under a uniform that, frankly, left damned little to the imagination. And she had a very _active_ imagination. Many nights, and more frequently of late, she found herself unable to go to sleep until she had 'taken care of herself' while imagining Wally there in her bed. It had caused a few accidents. He'd replaced her bedroom window twice.

But did that mean she _**loved**_ him? Like, Love with a capital L? Or was it just teenaged hormones calling the shots? Could hormones explain all the symptoms? He had a way of smiling when he thought she was doing something cute that absolutely yanked her stomach out from under her ribs. And the way he looked after her – even when she told him not to, even when it got on her last nerve or threatened to compromise their missions – made her feel, when she really, truly thought about it …

… well …

… cherished.

He had her well-being in mind. He cared about what she thought, and whether she was happy. He made her feel special. And she _really, really_ liked that feeling. In fact …

Five quick, hard raps sounded on their front door, and echoed through the apartment. That made her tense up, which pulled on her wound, which hurt like crazy, which made her groan again.

Wally was there before the sound died in her throat. "Are you okay? You hurt?"

"I just pulled my shoulder a little." Her eyes darted toward the front of the apartment. "Who's that?"

"Lemme see." And he vanished in a swirl of carpet dust. Almost a minute went by while he spoke with The Whoever, and Jinx's fears clustered in her chest, wound themselves into a tight knot for mating, and gave birth to a whole new crop of fears. As far as Wally could tell, nobody knew she was here, least of all the rest of the Titans. Even though she had distinguished herself at the Brotherhood mop-up, she still had four convictions, eleven active warrants (four for escaping) and was on three 'Most-Wanted' lists. The Keystone City police were all aware that she was currently lending their hometown hero a hand (for that matter, the _whole city_ knew it, thanks to a few astute photographers on staff with the local news outlets) and they appreciated it, even if most of them had no clue why she was there. But Robin was extremely frugal with his gratitude where former-nemesis types came into play, and as far as he was concerned Jinx hadn't proved herself yet. Ergo, he hadn't gone out of his way to remove her name from the aforementioned lists.

So she worried, and her current worry was given form and substance from her present state of vulnerability. She might be able to keep up a brave front for Wally, but she had been very seriously hurt and she knew it. Throwing hexes was not on the menu, at least not for a few days, to say _**nothing**_ of running anywhere. She could barely totter to the bathroom.

Most of what was said in the other room was too low for her to hear, but then Wally yelled, "You mean you're a **doctor?**" and half a second later she was looking up into the face of a tall, middle-aged gentleman who was desperately trying not to fall over after his abrupt trip.

He over-topped Wally by a good twenty centimeters, and was proportionally broad, but didn't seem terribly muscular. His hair had gone silver but wasn't really thinning out yet, and his mustache was still salt-n-pepper. He caught a hand on the head of her bed and steadied himself. "Ah! Miss Jinx. Please believe me when I say the pleasure is all mine!"

Her eyes had gotten rather rounder than normal. "Wa- um, Flashy, who is this?"

He bowed slightly at the waist. "My name is Adam Bryce Wattersen, and I am a fervid, if recent, fan of yours."

"… Fan? The hell?"

He chuckled briefly. "I don't fit the standard fanboy mode, I know."

"Yeah, for one, you're kinda too old."

"Sixty years young, Miss."

She caught Wally's eye. "Um … okay, so … why'd you let him in again?"

"He's a doctor."

Mr. Wattersen interjected, "Retired. I did mention that."

"Yeah, but you know more about that sorta thing than we do, for sure."

The gentleman studied the young metahuman lying in front of him. "Gunshot?"

"Yeah."

"Through-and-through, I take it?"

"Yeah."

"May I take a look?"

"If you can do it without making me move. It … kinda hurts."

He knelt beside the bed. "Did this happen during that gang conflict yesterday?"

Wally nodded. "I missed one. He drew down on her from behind. Sorry coward."

"I _**thought**_ you'd taken fire. That's what it looked like on the news coverage. Didn't realize it was this serious, though." With a practiced gentleness, their guest unwound the bandages and then frowned at the damage. "That's quite an exit wound, there."

"Wally said he was using a .44 Magnum."

"Ouch."

"That's what I said. Once I came to."

His voice urgent, Wally asked, "Can you help her, doc?"

"Let me get my things."

Jinx frowned at him. "Thought you said you were retired."

"As I am. But I happen to have something with me that will help with your case. Hold on." And he rose and trotted into the living room, returning immediately with a large, metal valise. He placed this on its side on the floor and opened it, revealing a bewildering array of high-tech gear. Carefully removing the tray holding the top layer of parts, he pulled an odd device out of a cubby in the lower tray. Looking up at Wally, he said, "This is only a part of what I was talking about." He came over to Jinx and said, "With your permission, I will see about accelerating your healing processes."

She blinked at him a few times and said, "Ooooookay? How's that work?"

Offering her the device, he said, "This unit will align its parameters with your individual system. It then begins to produce nano-scale, synthetic antibodies to prevent infection – which is beginning to make itself felt in your shoulder unless I miss my guess – and it contains a micro-lab that can make very small quantities of practically anything. For example, bone tissue to help your shoulder knit itself."

"No shit?"

"Truly."

"Where'd you get this?"

"I designed it. Well, that is, I came up with the concept and helped a friend of mine get the details right. He actually designed and built it."

"So this is _**your**_ tech? Who do you work for?"

"Ah, you have hit upon the issue at hand. I am self-employed."

"… Oh?"

"Yes. I have a … you might call it a vision. I have a vision for the superhero community, and I would very much like to start with you."

"Me? Why?"

"There are many specific reasons, but the most compelling, to me at any rate, is that you are a recent convert to the side of the angels."

She shot Wally an accusing glare. "What sort of shit have you been shovelin' this guy?"

Holding up both hands, he disavowed all knowledge of Mr. Wattersen's project. "He just showed up!"

"That's another thing." She turned her steely gaze back to their guest. "How'd you find me?"

"Ah. Well, as to that, it really wasn't hard." He tapped his head. "I am a metahuman myself. But my … _abilities_ do not lend themselves to the sorts of endeavors the two of you engage in."

In chorus, they asked, "What do you do?" Then they looked at each other and smirked.

"I am a sometime clairvoyant and precognetic." Looking at Jinx with a rather apologetic expression, he continued, "I was present during one of your encounters with the local criminal element about three months ago, and received a flash-imprint of your mind."

"… A what?"

"That's what I call it. It's like a cross-section in time. A basic map of your thoughts, feelings, motives, even your personal philosophy." He shrugged apologetically. "That's how I knew where you were, and that you had made a fundamental change in the direction of your life. It isn't really something I can control, and the intensity of the experience varies rather a lot. In your case, it was … nearly overwhelming. I was in a daze for about thirty hours while my subconscious assimilated what I learned." He gave her a grin. "That's when I became your Number One …" Looking back up at Kid Flash, he chuckled and revised his statement. "Make that, your Number Two Fan."

Wally had the grace to blush furiously.

"In any case, in the last three months I have turned my hand solely to the task of crafting your … well, I'll get to that. First, let's see about getting you well."

"Works for me. What do I do?"

"Hold this." He handed her a thin, metal strap. "Press that contact and hold it across your forehead for a few moments."

She did so, and the device made a muted whirring sound, ending in a triple beep.

"Now, we will place this interface surface over your wound." Gently, he did just that.

In a few seconds, the pliable film had adhered to her skin and she gave a small gasp. Where before the wound was ragged and puckered and red and hot, suddenly there was a cool tingling, and the sharp edges of her pain eased away and vanished. She drew a long sigh and actually _**relaxed**_ for the first time in over a day. "That … feels … fantastic."

"I am so glad! I hoped it would work that way."

Wally asked, suspiciously, "What _**other**_ way might it have worked?"

"More slowly. You see, the only other person for whom I've built a unit was my partner, and he, ah … well, he is no longer among the living."

"What? What happened to him?"

His face took on a melancholy air. "Drunk driver. Killed instantly. Some five months ago. Left a wife of twenty-two years and three children."

"That's horrible!"

"More than you know, my boy, more than you know. The world lost a great genius and his wife lost her best friend. For that matter, so did I." He squared his shoulders. "He is one of the reasons for my … um, crusade, as it were."

Wally cocked an eyebrow. "Crusade?"

"If you like. I want to make sure that his legacy does not go unacknowledged. To that end, I have devoted my life to this pursuit."

Jinx, who was getting _extremely_ comfortable, sighed again and asked, "What pursuit is that?"

He eyed the two of them. "Tell me," he said, "has either of you ever heard of a woman by the name of Edna Mode?"

They looked at each other and shook their heads. Wally asked, "Who is she?"

"She's a fashion designer."

Wally snorted, "_That's_ why I haven't heard of her."

"She's very independent. She no longer designs for the _haute couture_ market. She gave that up in favor of the military."

Jinx raised an eyebrow. "Beg pardon?"

"Specifically, she designs battle suits for the Special Operations crowd. Seals, Rangers, Green Berets. NSA. Maybe a few shadow organizations we never hear about."

The two young people looked at each other in deep puzzlement. "Battle suits?" inquired Wally.

"Just so. It seems that the military complex has … eh, heh, well, a _complex_ about superheroes. And villains. You get the idea. You can do things they can't, even with massive funding and the latest weapons. So, they are trying to come up with a new breed of super-soldier. But instead of producing a better human, they are outfitting him with a very specialized exoskeleton."

"Huh. Like a mecha?"

"Sort of. More like some _**really**_ sophisticated armor. They've deployed them a few times."

"I haven't heard about it," commented Wally.

"No, I suppose not. It isn't advertised. But there you are."

"Okay. So," asked Jinx, "what's that got to do with me?"

"I propose to give you a super-suit."

That earned him a blank look. "Explain."

"Okay, let's take your current situation. You were _more_ than holding your own in that battle, but then someone sniped you, correct?"

"Yeah, the bastard."

"How about if, when the bullet hit you, you were wearing a suit that distributed the impact over the suit's entire surface?"

"Whoa!" exclaimed Wally, "you can _**do**_ that?"

"Absolutely."

"Sounds clunky," observed Jinx.

"Ah, and you see, the military's models _**are**_ clunky. Very much so. But mine is not."

"How's that?"

"The top brass was interested in making what amounts to a tank that you wear. It had all the protection the soldier needs, but also gets fitted out with various weapons that the average soldier just can't carry. Their suits are true exoskeletons, and are patched into the nervous system. Since each one masses about three hundred kilos, there's no way the soldier could move in it unless it was self-propelled, which it is. So they've got .50-caliber rifles and grenade launchers and rail-guns and radar or laser targeting systems or, in one case, a downsized 12mm mini-gun."

"So what do _**you**_ have?"

He shook his head. "See, you don't need any of that. You aren't going to war; you're just fighting crime, and the occasional supervillain. Think about Dr. Light. What made him special?"

The 'light' dawned for them both. "His suit! He's just another skinny ol' scientist without it!"

Mr. Wattersen nodded. "Exactly. But you! Jinx, you carry your 'armaments' with you everywhere. You don't need any weapons or targeting systems or any of that stuff. All you need is … backup. That's what my suit will provide you."

"So it won't be clunky?"

"_Isn't_ clunky. I brought it with me."

Her eyes got very, very round. Her voice squeaked when she said, "Serious?"

"Yes. That's why I came here today. I finally got it finished. And I would very much like for you to try it out." He held up a cautionary hand. "When you heal. Which, if your accelerated pace so far is anything to go on, should be tomorrow night."

"Can I see it?"

He smiled broadly. "Of course." He all but jumped into the living room and wheeled a large, upright trunk back in.

She eyed it dubiously. "I thought you said …"

"This is merely its holding case. The suit itself weighs less than seven kilos and is quite pliable." He opened the case and displayed the suit.

It looked something like a diver's wetsuit, with attached gloves. The right arm and shoulder area was a deep lavender. A diagonal stripe of black covered the left shoulder, most of the chest and the right leg down to the knee, and the rest of the suit below that was lavender again. The full-coverage helmet was black, as were the calf-high boots.

Jinx smiled appreciatively. "Me likes."

"I thought you might." He picked it up and laid it across Jinx's stomach so she could feel the fabric.

"Ooo! Silky!"

"I won't go into too much detail, but the main fiber is a single molecule of a nitrogen-carbon-beryllium nano-material. It is partially self-repairing if it gets cut, which is highly unlikely, and will stop any non-armor-piercing round, and many that are, transferring the kinetic energy to the molecule and distributing the force evenly from the outside inward. If you get shot, you'll feel a brief squeeze all over, but that's about it; and the same goes for any other sort of blunt trauma you may receive. The superconductive nature of the weave means that you don't have to worry about electrical attacks. Or most lasers, for that matter. Plus, it is outfitted with a full-body version of the device currently attached to your shoulder, and the helmet has half an hour's worth of air, if you get into dangerous gas or underwater action."

Wally was goggle-eyed. "That is too cool!"

"This case," continued Mr. Wattersen, "will recharge the suit if the power cells get drained. One charge should last between eight and ten days, so a weekly overnight charging should be adequate."

"This thing," stated Jinx, "must have cost a fortune!"

He nodded. "It did. I sank my life's savings into this project."

That confused the girl. "So … what's in it for you?"

"Hopefully, a contract with the JLA, and possibly the Titans. I'm thinking of Robin, specifically, since he's a baseline. Extremely well-trained, but still only human. If he had a suit like this …"

"Holy cow!" yelled Wally. "And Speedy! And Aqualad! And Bee and Raven and Argent and …"

"Right. And Black Canary and Hawkman and Zatanna and The Huntress and Green Arrow and Aquaman and maybe even Batman, though I think he has something along these lines already." He chuckled. "Not as nice as mine."

Jinx frowned. "But what happens if one of 'em gets captured and the suit ends up with the bad guys?"

"Hee-hee! That's the beauty of this particular product! Just like that medical device, each suit is irrevocably bonded to its owner. If someone else tries to put on the suit, it will … ah, let us say, reject the bond. It would be a very, very unpleasant experience."

"Whoa. Huh." Wally thought that over. "But couldn't they, I dunno, reverse-engineer the thing?"

"Maybe. However, I did mention that my friend – his name was Martin Brewer – was a genius, right? Well, the suit's medical system can detect the mental state of its user, and if the suit is removed under duress it goes into lockdown mode. That means that until the original wearer contacts it physically, and gives it the command to open, it will be a rigid lump. Oh, sure, they could cut into it with the right tools, given time. But remember what I said about the micro-lab? It can make minute quantities of anything? The system's self-destruct mode doesn't leave much but a smoking hole, once the super-acids get done."

Wally was unsure. "That's … kinda scary."

"It has so many failsafes on it, your head would spin."

"Scary?" scoffed Jinx. "And what part of your normal day isn't? This thing sounds like Da Bomb to me. I can't wait to try it out!"

Mr. Wattersen grinned. "I was hoping you'd feel that way."


	2. Introduced

**Bespoke**

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_A/N: Aaaannnd here's the next chapter. Seems to sort of be writing itself, y'know?_

_Still don't own the Titans. No monetary gain being realized here. Go about your lives, citizens._

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**Chapter Two**

_* * Wednesday 19 August, 10:15am * *_

"Wally?"

Kid Flash looked up from the kitchen table (currently littered with diagrams and schematics) where Mr. Wattersen was apparently showing him something. Their guest followed suit, and both of them goggled at her.

She stood there in the doorway, the regeneration device in one hand and the suit in the other, with a quizzical look on her face. "Oh! You're still here!"

"Yeah," answered Wally, "I told him he could stay the night. He didn't want to miss anything."

"But I did not," the older fellow said, "expect you to be up and around this early." He rose and walked over to her. "May I?"

She shrugged. "Knock yourself out. But, seriously, it doesn't hurt at all." She worked her arm around. "See? Nothin'."

He moved the fabric down and out of the way (while Wally tried, unsuccessfully, not to stare) and then drew a quick breath. Running a finger along the unblemished skin, he marveled, "Amazing! He said he'd made a few tweaks in the design, but I never … this is … simply amazing!"

"And it feels really good." She turned around and presented the back of her shoulder. "Clear back there, too?"

"Perfectly." He took a step back and thought hard for a moment before shaking his head. "Perhaps it has more to do with your own unique physical makeup. Or it may be a function of your powers. I don't see how the unit by itself could have manufactured that much regenerative material in …" He checked his watch. "Less than fourteen hours. My _most optimistic_ projection was about twice that."

"Well I ain't gonna kick about it."

"No, no, I suppose not."

"Anyhow, what I came out to ask – and I'm glad you didn't leave, Mr. W. – was, how the heck do I get into this thing?"

"Ah. Yes, the first time is a bit more complicated. You must be introduced."

"… Come again?"

"As with the device we employed last night, the suit needs to 'learn' your mental signature. I wanted to be here to help with that." He gave a nod toward Wally. "And he had many, many questions about the suit and the failsafes it contains. That's what we were discussing when you came in."

"Oh. Okay. Cool." Giving Wally a glance, she asked, "So, are you satisfied?"

"Actually, yeah. Pretty much. Mr. Brewer was … really thorough. He must have thought about this for an _**awful**_ long time."

"Several years," agreed Mr. Wattersen. "It was close to four years from the time when he first broached the subject to the completion of the prototype. And that was over a decade ago."

Jinx looked shocked. "Wow. That seems like … kind of a long time to develop one product."

"Heh. I suppose. But you must remember, we both had 'day jobs' while we worked on this, and we were using our own funds for all the materials and support structures. Also, there are eight 'earlier-generation' suits back at my house."

"Eight? For who?"

"Oh, not for anyone. Four of them were just sort of 'test bed' type attempts, and two more had dangerous flaws of one type or another. The most recent two were a lot more basic than what you are holding there. Number Seven, for instance, weighs over twenty kilos, which would be unsuitable for most humans to walk around with all day."

"Whoo, got that right!" agreed Wally.

"And Number Eight was based on a material related to Kevlar. It offered reasonable protection, but nothing like what yours will do. Confidentially, he developed that fiber after working on a project for the DoD. He gave them what they wanted, but it got him thinking in a new direction, and that's when he came up with this," he said, pinching the suit's fabric. "The nitrogen-carbon bond is theoretically stronger than the carbon-carbon bond, due to atomic structure, but nobody had been able to demonstrate it as a real-world product. He figured out a way, and it involved an interstitial beryllium ion that remains in the molecule and keeps it flexible."

Jinx's puzzled expression was back. "Well _**that**_ was over my head like the Astrodome."

"My apologies. I tend to get a bit technical under the best of circumstances, and working with Martin only exacerbated it. He had graduated first in his class with majors in physics, metallurgy, and electronics, then got a Masters in chemical engineering and another in computer applications of electronics, then got three PhD's. Had something like twenty-eight or twenty-nine patents, and could have had a lot more if he'd bothered to submit the paperwork. He was quite the polymath, and never stopped learning. Never satisfied, that was Martin."

"Supergenius, huh?"

"Something like that."

"Well, okay, then. I _**would**_ like for you to 'introduce' me to the suit. But first I have _**got**_ to have a shower." And after handing the suit off to Mr. Wattersen, she trotted back to her room.

He turned to Wally and said, "She is quite something, isn't she?"

"Oh, boy."

"You love her very much, don't you?"

"…"

The old gentleman grinned. "You don't need to say anything. I recognized that fact when you answered the door yesterday. Your concern and affection for her dominated your mind."

"… So … do you pick up on stuff like that all the time?"

"More or less, at a low level. Proximity helps, of course, and physical contact will firm up a transmission if one is there already. But, as I said, I can't control it. Sometimes I will go days between episodes, and sometimes I get bombarded for days at a time."

"That sounds … like it could be a problem."

He shrugged. "If I let it. It's one reason I never found the right girl to marry. Spend that much time around an individual and you will always learn something about her that you simply can't get past. Normal people can ignore such things or pretend they don't exist, but I am afraid I don't have that luxury."

"Damn. Sucks to be you some days, huh?"

"Oh, not that often. One adapts."

Wally turned back to the table and tapped a schematic. "So tell me more about this micro-lab thingy …"

##

The 'introduction' went off without a hitch, and Jinx shortly learned how to get the suit to open up along four different seams; it was actually much easier to don the suit than she'd feared. When it closed up and power was applied to the support systems, she got a lower level of that same cool tingle she'd felt the night before from the regeneration device. Her 'happy face' put both men at ease. "This is awesome! Does it feel like this all the time?"

"I don't know. I never put one on. Martin insisted on being his own guinea pig for the various tests we ran. He was a metahuman as well."

"… How's that?"

"He healed at an accelerated rate, much as you do but perhaps somewhat more quickly. Again, nothing that would prove useful in real combat, but nice to have if one is subjecting oneself to accidental electric shock or the possibility of superficial burns."

"That guinea pig thing, right?"

"Exactly." He rubbed his hands together. "So, now, let's try out your suit. You will notice that the helmet, though rigid, melds seamlessly with the neck of the suit. When it _**is**_ connected, it partakes of the same kinetic-redistribution qualities as the rest of the suit."

"Cool. So how do you want to try it out?"

"Hold out your arm."

She did so, and he tapped it with a thick dowel he'd brought. "Feel that?"

"Uh … kinda. I kinda felt it all over."

"And that's the idea." He rapped her arm harder. She giggled. He hit even harder, but her arm never wavered an iota.

"Oh, that is just _beyond_ cool! Hit me again! No, wait. Hey, Wally, get your dingbat."

"Uh … you sure?"

"Sure, I'm sure! Get it!"

"Okay." He returned in a second with what looked a little like a dark-blue, beefed-up belaying pin. "But this is made of a cobalt superalloy. It doesn't give."

"Whack me."

He sighed and whacked her arm. The dingbat ricocheted as if off hardened tool steel and, again, her arm didn't budge.

"I am _**so**_ lovin' this!" She raised her arm. "Hit me in the side."

It went on like that for several minutes, with increasingly violent blows, all of which the suit shrugged off. "The only thing is that a really hard whack makes me freeze for a piece of a second while it's doing that distribution thing."

"Is that going to be an issue?"

"Eh. Prob'ly not. If I'm in the middle of a leap or something and get hit, it might make me miss or land wrong."

"True. But you would also be un-perforated. And it won't affect your ability to strike, since the gloves and the boots aren't part of the circuit."

"Works for me." She opened the helmet's visor and looked over at Wally with a glowing smile. "Wanna go patrol?"

"You really sure you're up to it?"

She kicked off, took a three-step run, vaulted over his head, landed behind him, and struck out, stopping her fist half-a-centimeter from his back. "What do you think?"

Returning her grin, he said, "Let's go."

##

_* * 1:45pm * *_

"Too damn quiet."

Kid Flash smirked at his companion. "You know, some days I like it that way."

"It's boring."

Standing at the edge of the roof, her partner held his arms wide, encompassing the metropolitan area. "Which means that the populace of Keystone City can go about their daily lives uninterrupted by disaster, and since that makes my uncle happy, it suits me just fine."

"Blah-blah-blah. Still bored."

"You just want a chance to try out your super-suit."

She gave him a baleful glare and then slumped slightly.

"Wanna go for lunch?" he offered.

Brightening a little, she responded, "Might as well. There ain't _**dick**_ happenin' around here."

"You in the mood for anything special?"

"How's Chinese sound?"

"Sweet! A buffet!"

She laughed at him. "Thought that might get your attention, you bottomless pit."

"High metabolism."

"You give that excuse every time."

"It's _**true**_ every time!"

Giving up, she shook her head. "So, China Star okay with you? They've got sushi."

"Ick. Keep your raw fish. And don't tell Aqualad."

"Like Ol' Squidface would even talk with me. Get real."

"Squidface? You gotta be kiddin' me! You _have_ seen him, haven't you?"

"Eh, once. When we kicked the Brotherhood's ass. I wasn't impressed."

"Heh. You're in the minority opinion then. Shoulda seen Raven's face at the last all-Titans meeting when she caught sight of him. Real, live eye-stars, mouth open, line of drool, little hearts floatin' off her, the whole ball o' wax. I thought BB was gonna shit a brick."

She giggled. "Okay, yeah, I woulda liked to see that." Peering over the side of the building, she said, "Carry me?"

"What, you don't wanna just swan-dive into the pavement? That would test your suit, for sure."

"Funny man. There's still gravity to think about, and I don't believe that sudden deceleration would do my hair any good at all."

"You're gonna have 'helmet hair' no matter what you do, so it don't matter, do it?"

"Keep it up, mister." But she was grinning as she said it. Holding her arms out, she said, "Carry me. You know you want to."

That made him blink a few times. "Wh-what do you mean?"

A wiggle of her fingers was the only answer he got, that and her devious grin. But he loved that grin. And the girl it was attached to. Resigning himself to fate, he picked her up and ran down the side of the building.

##

_* * 2:20pm * *_

"Slow down, Kid, those pot stickers ain't going nowhere."

Shoveling another half dozen of the dumplings into his mouth, he swallowed and smirked at her. "You never know. They might be _Tamaranean_ pot stickers, and then where would we be? Look away for a second, and they walk off."

"… Eww!"

"I can see you haven't been exposed to Starfire's cooking yet."

"The way you talk about it, that sounds like a good thing."

"I'm goin' after elevenths. You want any more icky-fish?"

"Naw, I'm good." She held up her glass of tea. "I'll just nurse this 'til you're done. If you ever _**get**_ done."

"Har-har." He set his latest plate on the tall stack at one side of their table and trotted over to the buffet.

On the other side of the restaurant, a petite female figure of late-middle years observed the pair around her menu. A hidden ear-bud whispered to her, _Does she have the suit on?_

"Yes, of course," she muttered under her breath. "I told you she would, you know."

_I know what you said. It doesn't hurt to make sure._

"Whatevah, dahling. She looks … quite comfortable." She adjusted her menu marginally. "Now go bother someone else. Ze waitstaff is getting suspicious."

_No need to be all snippy._

She didn't bother with a reply.

##

_* * 8:15pm * *_

Sitting on the edge of the roof, Jinx had her legs pulled up against her chest and her arms wrapped around them, resting her chin on one knee while she watched the sun drop toward the horizon. A gust of wind pushed against her and Kid Flash was sitting there.

She glanced over at him. "Still dead?"

"Eh. Couple o' Einsteins in Gray's Mill Park tried a mugging. They had sneakers on, so I tied their laces together while they were chasing the girl. Both of 'em face-planted and left some o' their noses on the pavement. That conked 'em out, so I got the girl's statement, tossed 'em into the slammer and gave Sergeant Stevens my report. Besides that, nothin'." He pulled out a pair of switchblades and twirled them. "Souvenirs."

She snorted. "Your 'collection' is gonna take over the spare room."

"I'll donate it to the JLA sometime. Zatanna can keep 'em all in her hat and pull 'em out as needed."

"Oh, she'll love you for that," retorted Jinx, sarcasm dripping off every word.

"Of course she will! Ladies can't help it."

That earned him a dangerous look, and he quickly backpedaled. "Not that I ever _**do**_ anything about it! Really! Not interested!" Casting about for some other, safer topic, he asked, "Do you get hot in that suit?"

She decided to let it pass and gave him a shrug. "Now that you mention it, no. It's just really comfortable." She stood and stretched, which action he followed appreciatively. The suit clung to her curves and the color scheme accentuated the positive. Putting her arms akimbo, she stated, "Well, it doesn't look like anything weird is gonna happen, so I'm heading for the barn. If I run into anything worth mentioning, I'll give you a buzz, 'k?"

"You … you wanna go … by yourself?" His voice managed to combine incredulity, warning, and hurt into that one, short sentence.

She gave him a smirk and patted his cheek. "Being apart from me for an hour or two won't kill you, Flashy. I'll see you at home." She took a running start and leaped to the next building over, adding a little boost of pink energy to cushion her landing. He watched until she was out of sight, but then he frowned. _Hey, wait a minute! My apartment's in the other direction._

##

_* * 9:00pm * *_

_Wally's a sweet guy, but sometimes he just doesn't know where to look._

On a nameless loading dock, Jinx hunkered down in the deep shadow behind a stack of shipping containers, scanning the small railyard for what she felt in her gut was there. Eight days earlier they had busted a moderately large shipment of cocaine, which she knew would make the street price skyrocket and lure more suppliers out of the woodwork. She figured about enough time had passed that another big load should be coming in. And in her experience on the other side of the law, this was the most logical place for it to show up.

Now, there are two facts that you, Gentle Reader, need to know.

First, Jinx's body produced hex energy constantly; this was a condition she accepted as part of her environment, like the air she breathed. Ordinarily it built up in her nervous system, and if she didn't use it, it would bleed off as little 'accidents' around her. That wasn't a real problem most of the time, because she usually had some use for it; so it rarely got up to bothersome levels anymore. But today, as she had noted, was dead as far as criminal activity was concerned. Aside from a couple of little boosts, she hadn't used any of what she produced. The presence of hex energy in her system was something she monitored subconsciously, and it had become a reflex to keep it under dangerous levels. So, unless it got high enough to alert her, she didn't pay it any attention. That's why she didn't notice the discrepancy.

Second, the monitoring system in her super-suit was not quite an AI, but it didn't fall far short. Martin Brewer's genius extended into several disciplines, and he had managed to combine them into a gestalt that was most _**definitely**_ greater than the sum of the parts. The processor was not only extremely compact, it was evenly distributed throughout the suit, and had eighteen levels of communication redundancy. If it got damaged in one place, those functions would instantly be taken up by other parts. It was designed to acclimate itself to the idiosyncracies of its user, and Mr. Brewer had turned his considerable talent to making sure that it covered _all possible_ contingencies. To that end, he had given the processor a great deal of latitude in 'deciding' what constituted an idiosyncracy. So, shortly after she first donned the suit, the processor had analyzed her production of hex energy, derived the parameters for its use, and modified the suit to help.

Those modifications had been completed about two hours earlier. Now, the suit simply waited for the right conditions.

Jinx stiffened ever so slightly: two men had skulked into the shadows beside a resting train a little over a hundred meters away. As she watched, they were joined by two more from another direction. One man in each pair carried what couldn't be anything but an automatic rifle. She grinned to herself and melted into the night.

##

Carlos Nunoz studied the shriveled man before him and sneered in private contempt. But he said nothing that might piss the fellow off. This idiot was paying a premium for his shipment, so Carlos could afford to be magnanimous, even if he did consider those who dipped into their own stores to be the stupidest of the stupid. He glanced back at Nacio, his muscle, and muttered in Spanish, "He's not long for this world."

Nacio shrugged and hefted his AK-47, maintaining a stoic silence as he studied the M14 his counterpart carried. His position didn't require much more than a wary eye and a good aim, and those he supplied handily.

Carlos nodded at the other two men. "Mr. Watson, I trust you found our samples adequate?"

The emaciated man gave a short, sharp nod and asked, "Which car?"

"First, the money."

Mr. Watson passed him a briefcase. Carlos clicked it open and said, "Should I count it?"

"You think I'd be stupid enough to stiff MS13?"

_You're stupid enough to waste your life on crack_, was the thought that ran immediately through Carlos's mind, but he simply grinned and said, "I suppose not."

"Then which car is it in?"

"Follow me." He led them down to the fourteenth boxcar, and produced a key. "It is marked 'LIMES – CHILI'."

"That's good to know!" said a voice from above them. "Thanks!"

Both gunmen swiveled and brought their weapons to bear on the slim figure, but she leaped as they were firing. She nailed a perfect landing about five meters away and unleashed a hex at each rifle. And that's where it got really, really interesting.

Her intent had been to damage and disable the gas tube mechanism, rendering each rifle into nothing but a clumsy club. What happened instead was that both gunmen tripped and fell, and in the process of falling pulled the triggers again. The gunfire slashed downward and across in perfectly symmetric arcs, putting multiple holes in each member of the opposing group. All four men fell, dead before they hit the gravel.

Jinx stood there for a second, shocked into immobility, the word '**NO!**' reverberating around in her head several times. Then, her instinct for self-preservation taking over, she high-tailed it to the edge of the yard and found a concealed place from which to watch as the railyard security showed up. Half a minute and one frantic radio call later, she saw Kid Flash appear. And **_that_** was her cue to leave.

##

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_[Author's Note: Well, once again the characters have taken over the story. Now **I'm** the one interested in seeing where this is going. I trust Muse to tell me._

_Let me know what you think, okay?]_


	3. Attacked

**Bespoke**

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_A/N: Thanks for the feedback, guys. You all rock!_

_DC and Warner own the Titans. Disney/Pixar owns The Incredibles. I own the plot, such as it is._

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**Chapter Three**

_* * Thursday 20 August, 6:30am * *_

Dawn's light was beginning to add a little color to the items in Jinx's room, with an over-wash of lavender, thanks to her curtains. They moved slightly in the light, early morning breeze. Shadows gently played with the outlines of her suit, wadded into a clump and tossed into the far corner. She didn't really notice any of that, though, being asleep … finally.

The apartment had been dark when she arrived shortly before ten the previous night. She'd spent better than forty-five minutes making her way back, sticking to the alleys, the rooftops, the shadows, using every skill in her arsenal to make _absolutely_ _sure_ she wasn't being followed … or even noticed. And aside from a few very small 'boosts', she kept a tight rein on her hex energy.

Her first act upon gaining the privacy of her room was to strip off the suit and throw it across the room. Although she wasn't _completely_ certain, her gut told her that the night's disaster was the fault of her new duds. What else could it be? Nothing else was different. Nothing else had changed. And it had _**lots**_ of new and esoteric tech in it.

She sat on her bed in her boy-briefs and bra, chin on her knees, gazing in the direction of the suit, but seeing instead the faces of the four men as they died. They all looked so surprised, as if they had died too quickly to realize what was going on. Each one dropped where he had stood, and each one lay there with his eyes open, staring sightlessly up at the indifferent stars.

Her conscience had toyed briefly with the idea that they had deserved it, but she rejected that out of hand. Maybe they did; maybe they were the worst of the worst of the scum of the earth, with no living relatives, no friends, and no socially redeeming features.

It didn't matter.

In the first place, it wasn't up to _her_ whether they died or not. That's what all that judge-and-jury stuff was for. Smirking bitterly, she quietly chided herself for having fallen so completely away from the moral gray areas she used to inhabit. Kid Flash really _**had**_ rubbed off on her, and in more ways than she'd suspected.

In the second place, she had a clean record as far as killing was concerned. It gave her a small sense of pride that she could stand beside Wally and sort out the bad guys without having to resort to blowing them in half with her hexes. And if Wally found out she had killed those men …

Yeah. That didn't bear thinking about. Not yet.

Which led to the third – and possibly most critically important – point: she should have _**way**_ better control over her hexes than that! If things were going to go sideways every time she unleashed a blast … well, she'd have to re-think the whole hero gig. That idea didn't set well with her _at all_. Though she denied it every time Wally teased her about it, she really had become addicted to the feelings of worth and accomplishment that being a hero brought her. She _**couldn't**_ give it up.

She wouldn't!

Which meant the suit had to go.

But … and here was where her thinking bogged down … what possible excuse could she give for not wearing the suit? Wally already knew she loved the way it felt when she wore it. She chewed on her lower lip while chewing on that problem. There was no excuse she could come up with that Wally would buy, and any such waffling would raise red flags in his mind like warts on a toad. She could see his face, twisting up in bafflement and suspicion, and it nearly gave her vertigo. No, so far as she could see, that wasn't gonna happen. She'd just have to wear the suit and work around the danger.

But could she do it? Her use of hexes in many situations was almost a reflex. Her mind automatically catalogued the architectural details of any room she entered, identifying exits and support members and weak points, any of which she could exploit with a well-placed hex. She had invested many hundreds of hours – verily, over a thousand – in honing her ability to direct and target her probability-altering energies. She could meter it tightly, producing a lance of power that would destroy anything it hit, or just making enough of the stuff to soundlessly open a locked door. She could spread it out into a defined space, wreaking minor episodes of havoc among a group. Or, she could do exactly what she'd _intended_ to do to those rifles. It was something she'd practiced – and practiced **A LOT** – because she figured it would come in handy, and it had, several times. There was nothing more priceless than the look on a thug's face when he swung up his trusty machine gun, pulled the trigger … and nothing happened. It would really make Jinx's day to have him stand there, a stupified look on his face, repeatedly trying to fire the gun, while she sauntered up and cold-cocked him with a side-kick to the temple.

If, instead, the gun was going to shoot someone else, or maybe even just blow up whenever she tried to hex it, that would really limit her effectiveness in combat. She worked through dozens of possible scenarios, trying to come up with effective-yet-non-lethal methods for dealing with each of the situations that might be presented in a typical fight. She worried the problem until she finally fell asleep, exhausted, several hours later.

##

_* * 9:00am * *_

The knock came hesitantly on her door, so much so that it didn't disturb her slumber. Wally knocked again, louder, and called, "Jinx? You in there?"

It was his voice that dragged her eyes open. She stared around the room stupidly for a second, then the events of the previous night came flooding back in, a sluice of icy water raced down her back, and she sat bolt-upright in her bed. "Don't come in!"

"It's okay! I'm not. I just … just wanted to talk to you about last night."

"… What …" She pulled the sheet up to her shoulders and balled it in her fists. "… what _about_ last night?"

"Something happened. Something really, really bad. Can you come out and talk?"

"Uh …" _What does he know? Did he see me? Did he track me? Did someone else see me? Does he have the cops with him? Is he gonna turn me in? He's a hero. He can't just __**ignore**__ a murder, much less four. What's he gonna say?_ "Yeah. Lemme get dressed."

"Okay. But, um, hurry, okay? There's kind of a lot to cover."

Rummaging around in her closet produced a pair of relatively clean white capris and a purple long-sleeved tee. She shrugged into them and ran her fingers through her hair while scanning her image in the mirror. _You look like hell, girl. Can you at least _**try**_ not to look so guilty?_ Then she drew a long breath, squared her shoulders, and marched out to the living room.

Wally was alone, which was good, but he was in his Kid Flash uniform, which might be bad. Pacing around in the kitchen, he grabbed random food items and stuffed them into his mouth. Then he noticed Jinx, and zipped over to her, taking one of her hands in both of his. "Are you okay?"

That earned him a couple of confused blinks. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"I don't mean to be goin' all mother hen on you, but … well, with all the shit that went down last night, I was worried."

"What shit? What are you talking about?"

He turned away and rested his laced fingers on top of his head. "Somebody started a war."

"… What?"

"Yeah. It's gonna be bad and it's gonna be big and Keystone's gonna be right in the crosshairs."

"_What_ war? I didn't hear anything!"

"Oh, it hasn't started yet, not for real. But it's just a matter of time now." He strode back into the kitchen and started eating again.

"You, uh, wanna explain what you mean?"

He brought a half-gallon of milk and a package of Oreos with him as he plopped down on the couch. "Last night, at the docks, there was a drug deal goin' down. Couple o' mid-level guys from Saunders's gang met with two delivery boys from MS13."

That bit of information made her draw her breath in a hiss. She hadn't known that the most violent gang in the Western Hemisphere was involved! That jacked her situation up to a whole new level of Totally Fucked. But she kept her outward reactions under tight control, sitting down next to Wally and gazing intently into his face. "So … MS13 is trying to move into Keystone? Is that why there's gonna be a war?"

"No, but that would be bad enough. No, what happened was that somebody … well, what Captain Stone came up with was that Watson – that was Saunders's man in charge – tried a double-cross, and there was a real short gun fight, and … all four of 'em got killed."

Jinx jammed a fist up under her chin, her cat-like eyes huge. "Oh, shit!"

"No _**shit**_, 'oh, shit'. And here's the kicker: one of the MS13 guys was Enrico Nunez's first cousin."

"… Who?"

"Only the head of gang operations for the central third of the country."

"Holy _**fucking**_ shit!"

"Like I said: a war." He jumped up again and started pacing, his features a study in worry and apprehension. "And I don't have the first clue how to stop it. As soon as Nunez finds out his cousin got shot in Keystone, this city is gonna be a free-fire zone."

And Jinx hadn't thought she could possibly feel worse about what she'd done. She stared at the ceiling as a large, cold stone rolled into the room and up onto her chest. People were going to die, probably a lot of people. And it was going to be her fault.

##

_* * 1:00pm * *_

She had the suit on again. This time she carefully studied the ebb and flow of her hex energy, and was beginning to get a hazy idea of how the damn thing worked.

She could tell it was storing the energy, but didn't yet know just how or in what form. After 'watching' the flux leak out of her body and into the suit, she could follow it for a brief period, but then it would … change. It didn't dissipate. It was as if it was being compacted somehow, as if the suit was introducing a measure of order into the normal chaos so the energy could be bound up in a tidy bundle.

But it was _**right there**_, ready to be released for use. That much she could feel without any trouble. She drew a little of it off, sent it to her left hand and stared at the small, pink sphere of coruscating power. Well and good. She had no trouble accessing it; if anything, it seemed … almost _**eager**_ to return itself to her control. But exactly how the suit accomplished this feat was currently beyond her. Closing her fist, she reabsorbed the power.

"Hey, Jinx?"

Glancing up at her companion, she was suddenly struck and had to stop for a second to admire his form. Tall and lean and muscular, the young Titan was deceptively strong, as she had discovered early in their association. He could bench nearly 230 kilos, run at half the speed of sound while carrying someone, and punch twenty opponents per second. That tactic, however, occasionally resulted in a broken hand, and even taking his highly accelerated metabolism into account, that worried Jinx. After brainstorming with her one night, he had developed his 'dingbat', the superalloy club he used occasionally to even the odds if he was seriously outnumbered. He had very rarely met anyone who could shrug off a knock to the noggin from a supremely hard object moving at Mach 6. He just had to be careful to make the contact a glancing blow, or he'd be cleaning brain matter off the near walls. Jinx gave herself a shake and answered, "Yeah? See somethin'?"

"No, not yet. Realistically, they probably won't be movin' in 'til tonight."

That pulled a frown onto her face … not that he could see it, given her helmet. "Then what're we doin' up here?"

"Just in case."

"In case of what?"

"In case I'm wrong. In case Captain Stone's wrong." He stepped down off the edge of the roof and moved over to stand beside her. Together they gazed out over his city. Muted sounds of traffic, the far-off chatter of a pneumatic hammer, and the random assortment of city-bred noises both deep and shrill wafted up to them. After half a minute of silence, he reached over and gently took her left hand with his right, an action that startled her just a bit. She darted her eyes his way, then down at their hands for a few seconds, then back up at him, to find him looking steadily at … her faceplate. "Jinx?"

A swallow forced its way past her throat before she could answer. "Yeah?"

"Would you take your helmet off? Please?"

She readily complied, especially since that meant she could disengage their hands. When her hair came free and she shook it out, he took the helmet from her and laid it on the roof. She gave him the benefit of her most intense gaze and asked, "Um … what's up?"

Again, he had her hands, both of them, and was facing her squarely. She hadn't noticed him move, an unsettling effect that irked her when she thought about it. But right now, with her small hands in his, and his intense, shining blue eyes on hers, she really didn't have room in her brain to think about it. She swallowed again and gave him a questioning look.

He sighed and moved a quarter-step closer. "Jinx … I just … I wanted to … I'm really glad that you're … that you've stuck with me. In this. Doin' this hero thing." His voice was rushed, more so than normal. "It really means a lot to me."

"… O – okay?"

"And I'm grateful and stuff, and you're really good at it and … and you do the hero things … you know, the things heroes do … you do it great."

"Um … thanks? What are you …"

"But that's not all!"

She just blinked at him, her throat constricting.

Another sigh. "Um … look … I, uh … God, why is this so hard? Jinx, there's … there are an awful lot of things about, uh … about you that … that is, that I … um …"

She tried to speak, but her intake of breath pulled in something extra and she coughed several times instead. He got that concerned look on his face that she'd been seeing so much of lately, so she just held up a hand to keep him at bay while she pounded on her chest. It took most of a minute to get herself flying right, and then she paused and gave him that questioning look again. "You were sayin'?"

"Yeah. I was. See, what with us working so close together and, uh, living, you know, in the same apartment and stuff, see, I've had a lot of time to …"

His communicator beeped loudly, in a pattern he recognized. The scowling scowl that grew on his face was sour enough to chase away any lesser scowls in a nine block area. "Shit," came out under his breath as he was unlimbering the com unit. "Kid Flash here."

Sure enough, Captain Stone's gravelly basso profundo came out of the device. "We've had our first incident."

Casting a mightily frustrated glance at the girl beside him, he asked, "Where?"

"Saunders's neighborhood. It's called 'The Cedars'. You know it?"

"Yeah. I'll be there in a second. Got an address?"

"500 Image Court. I sent the GPS to your com."

"Right. Kid Flash out." He flipped it shut and turned a profoundly unreadable gaze on Jinx. "I've, uh …"

She waved a hand at him, relieved beyond measure to postpone their conversation. "Go on. Do your hero bit. Let me know if you need backup, 'k?"

He nodded once and then vanished in a strong breeze.

After standing in that one spot for a couple of minutes, she shrugged and decided to do a little patrolling.

It gave her some time for introspection. Wally had spent a couple of hours that morning getting her up to speed on the latest MS13 news, and none of it had left her with any pleasant feelings. They were well-trained, well-equipped, and utterly without scruples. One of them, for example, had shot everyone in the car in front of him when that car had blocked his way, even though the other driver was just waiting for a bicycle in the crosswalk. They took revenge very, very seriously, and preferred murder over just about any other form of negotiation. Before yesterday no one had ever heard of them operating in Keystone City. That was about to change.

_And it's all my fault._ That kept ringing around in her head like some kind of demonic refrain. She vacillated between wanting to run away from the whole mess and trying to see if she could stop the invasion single-handed … which, considering her relatively random nature, really wasn't too far-fetched.

As she hopped from building to building in the downtown area, a small figure followed her progress through a pair of high-tech electronic binoculars. "She seems to be making a large circle around ze city center. It looks as if she is on patrol."

The tinny voice in her ear asked, "Can you tell if she's using the suit to …"

"Not from zis distance."

"Can you get closer?"

"Can you be slightly less tiresome?"

"Well excuse me for caring!"

"You must learn patience, dahling."

"I still think I ought to be the one doing the shadowing."

"Nonsense, dahling. Who else could make ze adjustments zat will need to be made? And under zese conditions?"

"Yeah, but you aren't bulletproof, and like that kid said, there's about to be a gang war in that town."

"Have a little faith, dahling! Did you imagine I would undertake zis effort unprepared?"

"Well … no, but …"

"Do you sink I only make super suits for supers?"

"Um …"

"Exactly. Now hush and let me work."

##

_* * 4:00pm * *_

"I so _totally_ did not need this."

Jinx glanced up from her burrito. "Hey, _you're_ the one who pulled me into this hero gig in the first place. Don't complain about what _you_ caused."

He crossed his arms. "So that's it? You just gonna ditch the suit? What if you get shot again?"

"What if _you_ do?"

"I can dodge 'em!"

"Yeah, well, so can I."

"But you didn't. Remember?"

She shrugged. Jinx had come up with a plausible – well, at least semi-plausible – excuse to not wear the suit. She told Wally that it was messing with her hex energy and making her uncomfortable. He'd called Dr. Wattersen, who was supposed to be on his way over to Wally's apartment.

"I should have just zipped over there and carried him back."

"Him and all his stuff? Didn't you say he wanted that big …"

"Yeah, yeah, okay. You're right." He gave her a one-shoulder shrug. "Sort of. I could have made three trips."

"Whatever. He'll be here in, what? Ten minutes, tops? The world won't end before then."

However, as is often the case when tempting fate with such a pronouncement, it suddenly sounded as if the world truly _**was**_ coming to an end.

Automatic fire raked the front of the building, blowing out every window on that side of the apartment. Screams sounded from all the adjacent units, and Kid Flash galvanized into action. He blurred out for several seconds. Jinx knew he would be going to all the other tennants to check for wounded and get them out of the line of fire, and that it would take him some effort, what with the necessity of vibrating through the walls in case of locked doors. She was crawling (very quickly) toward her room when a small, round object sailed in through a broken window. Recognizing it instantly, having tossed a number of them herself, she was ready with a quick hex that extended the timer by about five seconds. Then, scooping it up, she lobbed it back out the window it came in, counting, _"… four … three … two …"_ to herself. There was a very satisfying explosion followed instantly by a couple of ragged screams.

About the time she made it back to her room, the gunfire stopped and Wally showed up again. His features were drawn into a tight knot of what looked like the bastard offspring of concern and fury. "Three dead. Eight wounded. The bastards are targeting me, but they don't care who else dies."

"How do you know …"

"They have a bi-directional sonic barrier up. It's nearly invisible and doesn't do anything to bullets, but it screws with my brain if I touch it, and then I can't go very fast. I've run into 'em before. Literally. Hurts like crazy."

"So we can't touch 'em? How fucked up is that?"

"I didn't say that. You can't hear 'em shooting, right?"

Realizing that this was true, she nodded. "Yeah? So?"

"So I caught a few of their bullets and threw 'em back."

Comprehension dawned. "Uh-huh! Didn't like the ricochets so much, did they?"

"No, but don't count them out. They have an arsenal. And we need to get out of here, and they need to see me leave." He blurred briefly and then was holding her suit. "Put this on."

"Wally, I already told you …"

"Yeah, I know what you told me. But it makes you bulletproof and bullets are what's for dinner. So slip in."

Grudgingly she did so. "So we're just gonna scram? Not try to fight 'em?"

"Not yet, and certainly not here in this residential neighborhood. They've already done enough damage that can be laid at my feet, and I'm not about to give them another chance. Come on." And he flipped her up into his arms and ran outside.

When Jinx got a good look at what was facing them, she understood his point. No fewer than three heavy APCs squatted in the street, loaded down with gangbangers and bristling with gun barrels. Wally paused just long enough for one of them to notice him and shout a warning, then he took off up the street away from his apartment house – as much as was left of it – at what was for him an easy lope, surely no more than eighty kilometers an hour. Jinx got a grip on his shoulders and looked back, then got a chill. "They've got big guns!"

"I know."

"No, I mean, like, cannons! Wally, look out!"

Kid Flash whipped around and stared, then turned and took off in earnest, just ahead of the first rocket to come down. It hit some forty meters behind them and exploded. Wally was fast enough to avoid the shrapnel, but the shock wave that transmitted through the street knocked him off his feet very effectively. He skidded, dropping Jinx, bounced off a utility pole, and slammed into the side of a building, ending up in a heap on the pavement.

Jinx hit the road at an odd angle, but her suit absorbed the impact. After that smack, she was able to land with a semblance of her normal grace. She saw that Wally wasn't moving, and was obviously unconscious. Looking back down the street, she saw the APCs approaching rapidly, another gun turret swinging around their way, and her eyes flamed with a sudden onslaught of pink energy.

The ex-thief didn't lose her temper very often anymore. It used to be a daily phenomenon when she lived with the H.I.V.E. Five. One or the other of them was constantly doing something to royally piss her off. But since following Kid Flash out 'into the light' as he liked to put it, she had been forced (usually) to control her urges to hex the crap out of anyone who rubbed her the wrong way. This situation, however, was different. She wasn't totally sure she was In Love with Wally West, but it was definitely at least the next best thing, and she wasn't about to let anyone kill him.

The air around her ignited in candent flames of lavender and fuchsia, and with a gutteral cry of rage, she threw the insane energies at the oncoming vehicles.

The first one in line emitted two sharp crackling noises and settled clumsily to the ground on broken axles. The second one, immediately following, plowed into the first one's rear, flipping up and over and coming down on it, top-to-top. The superstructures of both APCs cracked, shuddered briefly, and collapsed, crushing all of the men inside instantly. The last vehicle skidded to a stop, but the brakes on one side failed and it whipped around to the left, teetered on two wheels for a second, and flumped down on the driver's side, severing a fuel line. Diesel oil began to puddle on the pavement. The men inside yelled and cursed and one of them began to climb out of the passenger side door, now pointing straight up. Then one of the RPGs they carried fell out of the magazine and hit the interior of one of the windows.

The resulting explosion (the rest of the ordnance in the troop carrier having fired) and fireball sent a mighty heat wave washing over Jinx, and she pulled back, running over to where Wally lay against the wall.

_More of the gang dead, a lot more, and I did it again. Me. Just me._ The enormity of her actions hadn't really settled in her mind yet, and she was studiously ignoring the implications. Instead, she studied her companion's predicament. "Damn. Hell and damnation, Wally, I'm kinda strong but I can't carry **_you_** very far." She tried to maneuver him around so she could pick him up, but couldn't find a good grip.

"You will not have to worry about him."

Jumping to her feet, Jinx whirled and dropped into a fighting stance. "Stay back, you!"

"Please, dahling, I have no wish to harm anyone." The speaker was a tiny woman of late middle years, standing there with her hands clasped in front. "I am here to help. As you can see and hear, ze police are arriving even now. Zey will take care of your friend."

Jinx pulled back and stared hard at the diminutive figure. "Who the hell are you?"

"I doubt my name would mean much to you, dahling. But I believe I can help you wiss ze problems you are having wiss your suit."

That jerked her attention around front-and-center. "Wh-wha-what problems? What are you talking about?"

"I am talking about ze redirection of intent, and ze re-mapping of probability matrices zat seems to be falling somewhere outside of your expectations. But we will deal wiss zat. Come along now."

"Come? Come where? Who _**are**_ you?"

Edna Mode reached over and latched onto Jinx's hand. "A friend, dahling. And I believe you could use one about now." Her free hand pulled a small, flat device out of a pocket and she pushed a large button on its surface. With a muted _***VOIP***_ the pair spiraled into a point of nothingness and winked out.


	4. Worried

**Bespoke**

. . .

. . .

. . .

_DCand Warner together own the Titans. Disney/Pixar owns the Incredibles. I made up the plot of this story out of whole cloth at the behest of my lovely Muse, so IT belongs to me. Inasmuch as I don't make a nickel off any of this, I would super-much appreciate it if the above-named super-powered corporations and their flesh-eating lawyers would just ignore me._

. . .

. . .

. . .

**Chapter Four**

_* * Thursday 20 August, 4:18pm CST * *_

_[ Channel 7 News live feed from the corner of Freemont and 19th ] "Are we rolling? Good. (clears throat) This is Cynthia Jones on the scene of the huge firefight that just took place in the Eastbrook community."_

_[ switch to view from helicopter – Cynthia does voice-over] "As you can see from our Channel 7 Eye-In-The-Sky, Keystone City was apparently attacked by what can only be described as a large and very well-equipped mercenary force. At this time we have no obvious motive, and none of the known terrorist groups has come forward to claim responsibility. But we __can__ tell you that civilian casualties so far are high. The attackers' first target was an apartment complex, which took severe damage. At least three are known dead with nearly a dozen injured."_

_[ ground-level view of the two destroyed APCs and the one on its side, still burning furiously] "But the terrorists reckoned without our hometown superhero, Kid Flash. We are not sure at this time exactly what happened or how he did it, but as you can see here, he answered their attack in a very … decisive way. Also, since the authorities haven't yet been able to go through the wreckage, it is not known yet how many terrorists were involved in the attack, or whether any of them survived. The police are on-site now and will be questioning witnesses for details."_

_[ camera cuts to a view of an ambulance pulling away down the street, lights flashing ] "Kid Flash was injured in the battle and is being transported to Bell Memorial Hospital. We have no word on his condition, but he was unconscious and the paramedics had him strapped to a back-board when our news crew arrived."_

_[ cut back to a view of the burning APC, a few civilians watching from a safe distance ] "Your Channel 7 News Team will keep you informed as this tragic situation unfolds. This is Cynthia Jones. Over to you, Jack."_

##

_* * Edna's base, 4:07pm * *_

_***V*O*I*P***_

Jinx dropped about three centimeters when they appeared and promptly fell on her rear. Flopping like a trout on land, she held her head in her hands and tried hard not to throw up.

Edna, while stepping over to a compact control bank, waved a hand dismissively and said, "Don't worry, dahling, you get used to it after a few teleports."

"… Good … God … what …"

"Now, what we must first do is determine what sorts of tech dear Martin used when he constructed your suit. Because obviously he did not take your, ah, unique situation into account."

Finally able to sit up without the room spinning, Jinx squinted unsteadily at her benefactor. "Wha-" She coughed twice and shook her head. "Whoo! What'd you say your name was?"

"I didn't, dahling, but you may call me Edna."

That rang a bell. She thought hard for a moment and then snapped her fingers. "Edna Mode?"

"Why, yes! You have heard of me, zen?"

"_**Of**_ you, yeah. Dr. W. mentioned your name. You're a fashion designer, but you make hardware for the military now, right?"

"From time to time, dahling, from time to time. I am currently what you might call freelancing." She had been fiddling with various readouts and touchscreens on the control board, and a holographic display appeared above it. "Very nice! Now, let us have a look at your suit, shall we?"

"Uh … on or off?"

"On, dahling, on! I need to see how it interacts wiss your razzer unique physiology. Come, come, sit here."

Jinx took the indicated seat. "So are you saying that the … that is, my, ah, problems are the suit's fault? That's what I thought. I was afraid to tell Wa- … um."

"Yes, yes, Kid Flash."

"Is he gonna be okay?"

A cocked eyebrow tracked around her way. Edna asked, "Why would he not be? He is a superhero, yes?"

"But … he took an awful wallop. And … and I've never seen him get … y'know … knocked out before. See, his metabolism …"

"Yes, he heals very quickly. Zat is why you should not worry. Now pay attention …"

_Don't __**worry**__? That's easy for you to say!_ But Jinx didn't voice the thought. She was still coming to terms with her feelings for the boy, and now this crap had to happen. _How am I supposed to concentrate on what this Mode chick is talking about when I don't even know if Wally's okay or not?_

"Dahling! You must pay attention!"

"Sorry! I'm sorry. I'm just … worried."

"It can do you no good! A wise man said zat worry is interest you pay on trouble before it comes due. It wastes your time and saps your energy." Taking two fingers and pointing from her eyes to Jinx's, she continued, "Focus! We have much work to do. And if I am right, we have little time in which to do it."

##

_* * Titans' Tower, 2:44pm (4:44pmCST) * *_

A green spider monkey landed beside the kitchen table where Victor Stone and Raven were playing chess, and immediately morphed into Beast Boy's base form. "Guys! Hey, guys!"

"Gahhh!" The cybernetic teen startled badly and knocked against the table, spilling several pieces. "Damnit, BB, now look what you made me do!"

"Sorry, but you gotta come see this!" And he grabbed the much larger boy's left arm and tugged away.

Raven had narrowed her eyes at his first intrusion. Now she glanced at her chess partner. "Vic, we better go see what he knows."

His biological eyebrow rose in response: Raven? Taking seriously something that _Beast Boy_ said? "How's that again?"

She rose into the air and floated over to the giant flatscreen. Using a tendril of misty darkness, she called the remote to her and turned up the volume. Then all three watched, wide-eyed, as the special report resumed.

Beast Boy had been flipping through the channels, and when he got to Channel 6 ("Where Jump City turns for News!") there was an image that caught his eye in a big way. At the moment, the split screen showed three talkingheads: Mike Dale, the lead anchor, Monique Robbins, the co-anchor (whom they had all met at least twice, much to their chagrin), and a field reporter they didn't recognize. He was standing on a street corner with a scene of utter chaos behind him. "… a little over half an hour ago. As of this report, no one has stepped forward to claim responsibility, but there is a great deal of speculation among the populace that the Taliban might be involved."

Monique asked, "Is that what the local police are saying, Jim?"

"Keystone City law enforcement isn't saying much of anything right now. That's the sentiment from the man on the street. But as you can see, those look like military-grade armored personnel carriers. Or they were, before they met Jinx."

"Are they certain Kid Flash's partner was the infamous ex-villain?"

"Can you roll the tape again?"

Mike nodded. "No problem, Jim." He manipulated something off-camera, and the anchors' faces were replaced with a jerky video clip, obviously from someone's cell phone. "To clarify for anyone just joining us, this video was uploaded to Youtube about twenty minutes ago. It shows what happened that resulted in the grisly scene there now." The viewer's vantage point was elevated, probably four or five stories off the ground, and captured the scene of Kid Flash running away from the APCs while carrying a lavender-and-black-clad figure.

"That's it!" shouted Beast Boy. "That's what I saw! Keep watchin'!"

They did, following closely as the lead APC fired a rocket at the fleeing hero, then seeing him lose his footing, drop the other person, and careen off a utility pole and into a wall. Then his partner (they were guessing at that) got to her feet (yes, she was obviously female), and turned to face the oncoming armored vehicles. Raising her arms, the air around her lit up in violent pink flame.

"That is _definitely_ Jinx," said Raven under her breath.

All three gasped at the massive hex blast she loosed, and the screen went white. It flipped back to the news anchors, deep concern written all over their faces. The reporter said, "I've seen her in action before. She may have a new costume, but that's her."

"That's a … surprising level of power she's showing there. Have the police commented on that?"

"Not a word, Monique. But you're right. There is no record of her ever generating a hex blast of that magnitude before."

Monique smirked. "Maybe she was motivated. Maybe it's because she was defending her mate."

Jim chuckled and shook his head. "I don't know Kid Flash personally, but I'd be willing to bet that he has better taste than that."

Cyborg frowned darkly at that remark. "Snooty sonuvabitch don't know shit."

Raven, though she didn't say anything, found herself in agreement. While she didn't wholly trust the reformed thief quite yet, all the recent reports had been very positive. It looked as if Jinx was really trying to stick to the straight and narrow, and comments such as the one that reporter just made were not calculated to help.

But … and this was a BIG 'but' … the carnage she had wrought on their attackers could not possibly have avoided loss of life. The still-smoldering APC on its side in the background had what could only be a charred arm hanging out of the window, and the two in the foreground (which were just now being separated by a large crane) were totalled in such a fashion as to preclude anyone's surviving. How many men had Jinx just killed? That question bothered all three of the Titans in the room.

Mike Dale was talking again. "… on his condition? We know they took him to a hospital strapped to a back-board."

"Not at this time, Mike. No official word, although we do know he was unconscious when they put him in the ambulance."

"Thanks, Jim. You'll let us know if the police make a statement?"

"You'll have it live, Mike."

A paparazzi-style photo of Robin and Starfire faded in to replace the reporter. Monique said, "Speaking of heroes, two of our local super-sweethearts were spotted outside Club Nine last …"

Raven hit the OFF button. Turning to the others, she asked, "Where is Robin?"

Vic made a vague gesture with one arm. "He said he was gonna take Star to the matinee showing of some movie she wanted to see, and then they were goin' for ice cream."

"Well," she countered with a roll of her eyes, "as much as I dislike interrupting them when they are engaged in such _important work_, I think Robin will want to know about this as soon as possible." And she pulled out her T-com.

##

_* * Edna's base, 5:30pm * *_

"Once more."

"But I'm tiiiiiiiired! And huuuungry! You're gonna make me waste away t' nothin'."

"Discipline, Miss Wrangler. What you need is discipline."

She pouted. "I told you I don't like that name. Call me Jinx."

"And I do not like _your_ lack of focus. When you have mastered zis technique, I will refer to you as 'Jinx'. Not before."

The girl sighed and took her position. "But this is stupid! When am I ever gonna need to do anything like this?" Some thirty meters away stood a long wall with four targets in front of it. The targets hung from a sort of 'mobile' thing and moved in random directions, pushed by strong puffs of air from a series of nozzles.

"You have been in battles where you faced multiple opponents. While you are most competent, your brain is not able to process more zan two of zem effectively at any one time. However, your suit does not have zis limitation. You wish to master ze suit. Zis is how it must be done. Now, concentrate!"

Jinx was getting mortally tired of hearing that word. "I **am** concentrating!"

"You may sink so, but you are not using ze suit's AI."

"Dr. W. said it wasn't really an AI."

"Indeed, when he handed it over, it was not. But after interaction wiss your hex energy? Ah, zat is a different matter altogezzer."

"… Huh?"

"I told you zat in ze beginning. You have changed ze suit."

"Well, yeah. You said … wait a minute. You said I'd had an effect on the circuitry!"

"And what is an AI but a highly advanced group of circuits?"

"But … but …"

"You are losing focus again, Miss Wrangler."

With an exasperated huff, Jinx glared at the roaming targets. "So how does this work again?"

"Ze suit's AI will operate as an extension of your mind. It is under your control, but you must learn how to _effect_ zat control. Ze first step is to identify all your objectives …"

##

_* * Titans' Tower, 4:05pm (6:05pmCST) * *_

Five young heroes gathered around the huge monitor, which Vic had configured to show eight channels simultaneously. The attack on Keystone City was the lead story on all the commercial networks, not the least reason being Kid Flash's condition. He was still unconscious, had suffered a concussion, and the surgical team was in the middle of a trepanning operation to relieve pressure on his brain.

In the last hour, two more witnesses had come forward with video of the attack. One showed basically the same scene as the first one, but from a different angle, at street level and behind the attackers, so that Jinx could just barely be seen. That video went into white-out at the same spot, which Raven explained as an eddy effect of the metahuman's hex matrix. The other piece, though, was shot from farther away, and did not suffer the same cut-off. So Jinx could be seen trying to help Kid Flash. Then another figure appeared behind her, they spoke briefly, and then the two of them vanished.

"Another teleporter," Robin groused. "Just what we need."

"Vic, did you capture that?" asked Raven.

"You know it." He replaced the split screens with the one video, and replayed it.

Starfire observed, "It is very grainy. I do not believe it was made with the 'Hi-Def' technology."

"No," agreed Cyborg, "but I think I can enhance the image." He worked on the video for a few minutes while the others watched in tense silence. Finally he pulled up the section they were interested in and played it in a magnified format.

"Well," said Raven diffidently, "you can tell she's going gray."

Beast Boy added, "And she's, like, really short. Really, _**really**_ short."

"And she is wearing the large, round vision-enhancing lens assembly," observed Starfire.

Robin pointed at the image of the control device on the screen. "And she uses technology to teleport. It's not an inherent power. That's a plus."

"I wonder about that costume Jinx is rockin' there," said Vic. "Why the full-coverage helmet? I mean, it ain't like nobody'll know who she is. That hex force has a mighty recognizable signature."

Beast Boy nodded. "Got that right."

Robin was frowning. "Hey, Vic, back the vid up to just after the terrorists fire that rocket … yeah, right there … okay, now close in on KF and Jinx … no, not that much, I want to see it when she hits the pavement … yeah, like that … okay, now play it forward from there in slo-mo."

They all watched as the shock wave hit, and the two teens were knocked apart and crashed in their separate fashions. Cyborg followed Jinx's path closely.

With a grunt and a nod to himself, Robin said, "That's what I thought. See, she hit the ground on her shoulder. How fast are they going there, Vic? I make it better than three hundred klicks."

"Lemme see … get the vector plot … background comparisons … yeah. Whoo, man! Yeah, about 120, maybe 125 meters per second. That should have busted her up, maybe killed her."

"Right. And instead she just bounces back up like nothing happened."

Beast Boy gave him an incredulous look. "And you think her new suit did that for her?"

"Either that, or she's figured out some kind of invulnerability. Either way, we need to get over there and talk to her."

"And," added Raven, "we need to find out who that teleporter is and what she has to do with anything."

Cyborg stood. "I'll warm up the T-jet."

##

. . .

. . .

. . .

**A/N: Well, as typically happens in my stories, the characters have hijacked the plot. I still have an outline, but I don't know how much good it will do me now. Makes me curious as to where they are going with this.**

**All speculation is welcome. Kindly read & review.**

**Concolor**


	5. Confused

**Bespoke**

. . .

. . .

. . .

_Disclaimer:_

_Though I may cry and pout,  
carp and scream and shout,  
I do not own the Titans,  
I know beyond a doubt._

_This truly is a pity:  
I do not own Jump City.  
But I know the __plot__ is mine,  
So I'll just pen this ditty._

_And Disney/Pixar too  
Must collect their due.  
The Incredibles belong to them  
(Which I think quite a coup)._

_I thank you Readers, kind,  
and hope that you will find  
some pleasure from perusing  
these fragments of my mind._

_Concolor44_

. . .

. . .

. . .

**Chapter Five**

_* * Friday 21 August, 5:20am CST * *_

Being an early riser was just a part of what made Jinx the fabulously successful individual that she was. (That, at least, was what she had told herself until recently.) She had already had a shower and was sitting down to a large bagel with strawberry-flavored cream cheese when Edna came into the common room. The tiny designer nodded to herself. "I am pleased to see zat I did not need to drag you from your bed."

Swallowing her bite quickly, Jinx answered, "I like to be the early bird and the second mouse."

"Indeed."

"There's another bagel in the toaster oven if you're interested."

That pulled a smirk onto the older woman's face. She pattered over to the counter, examined the setup, and hit the start button before going to the refrigerator to retrieve a small jar of some very dark substance.

Jinx quirked an eye at it. "What's that?"

"Zis is black currant jam."

"… What's a currant?"

"A small, tart berry. It grows on a bush. Very popular in ze Old Country, but not so well known here. It has been a favorite of mine since I was a child."

"Yeah … speakin' o' which, where are you from, anyway? I can't place your accent."

A slight smile crept onto Edna's face. "I wondered why you did not make zis inquiry yesterday."

"You kept me too busy!"

The small woman snickered. "Perhaps." She poured herself a cup of coffee, took a sip, and nodded her approval. "You appreciate ze value of a robust brew. Where did you learn zis?"

"The H.I.V.E." She shrugged. "Weak coffee wasn't much help when you get three hours of sleep a night."

"Truly." Setting her cup down and folding her hands, Edna said, "To answer your question, I was born in Luxembourg. I grew up in Belvaux, in souseast Gutland."

"Huh. Never met anybody from there before."

"Not surprising, as it is a very small country. Zere are not many Luxembourgers to begin wiss, and very few of us have any reason to leave ze country. It is a good place to make a home."

"How come you left?"

The toaster oven chimed, and Edna retrieved her bagel before continuing. "During ze Second Great War ze Reich occupied and annexed Luxembourg. My parents were part of ze government-in-exile in London, and zey enrolled me in a prestigious private school while we lived zere. After ze war, I remained at ze school until graduation, but I returned to my home for my post-secondary training. Later, I moved to Paris. Eventually my work brought me to New York and I made my home in ze States."

Jinx eyed her speculatively. "So … how'd you end up with the military?"

The smile dimmed a bit. "Zat is a most convoluted tale, and one for which we do not have time at present." With a quick check of her watch, she transitioned to the fully-businesslike taskmaster Jinx had seen the day before. "Meet me on ze prototype test floor in fifteen minutes. We will resume ze training of your suit."

"Can I try some of that jam?"

"After you have mastered ze next technique."

_Sigh._ "Yes, ma'am."

##

_* * Bell Memorial Hospital – 8:00am CST * *_

Robin paced the length of the waiting room, his face a study of frustration. "Ridiculous, idiotic, bureaucratic bullshit."

"Ya know what they say, Rob. Death and taxes. And the only thing more permanent than taxes is a government office. They don't answer t' nobody, an' these so-called civil servants ain't paid to be _civil_."

Robin shot another dirty look at the tight knot of dark suits at the other end of the room. "All we want to do is help. We aren't interested in jurisdiction. He's a Titan, for God's sake!"

"An' they wanna pull us into a pissin' contest."

Beast Boy chimed in, "Hey, I can morph into an elephant, then we'd win any pissin' contest they dreamed up."

The other two gave him a pained look. Raven, who had been silent up until then, said, "Not helping, Garfield."

His brow clouded. "It's Beast Boy!"

"Whatever."

"I do not understand!" complained Starfire. "Why do they prevent us from aiding Kid Flash?"

"It's 'cause we're from outta state," answered Cyborg morosely.

"But are there not the 'Good Samaritan' laws? Surely they cannot do anything to us if we simply go in and allow Raven to heal him!"

Between gritted teeth, Robin muttered, "I'm just about ready to go that route."

Starfire turned to the other girl. "Raven! Can you sense where Kid Flash is being held?"

There was a slight pause before she gave a nod. "He seems to be on this floor. Not far from here. But his mental signature is … odd. Very weak."

"Is there anyone else in the room with him?"

A longer pause. "No. Not right now there isn't. There are only two people being treated in the ICU at present, one is female, and they're three rooms apart."

Kneeling in front of her friend, Starfire placed a tender hand on Raven's shoulder. Such was their friendship that the dark Titan didn't even flinch. "Then can you not teleport into the room, heal Kid Flash, and return before they are aware of your aid?"

"… Yes, Star … I could do that." She cast a sidelong glance at their leader. "Assuming it's all right with him."

Starfire bounced up and floated over in front of Robin, her hands clasped in front of her. "Please? May she do this healing of Kid Flash?"

Robin's gaze flipped between his team and the suits a few times, calculating some odds only he could fathom. Finally, he said, "We'll do it. But we can't be obvious, or they'll know something's up." Peering around the area for a few moments, he gave a curt signal to follow and made for an exit.

#

Low light lay easily on the high-tech equipment in the Bell Memorial Intensive Care Unit. The patient's head was thickly swathed in bandages, some of them draped over his eyes to keep even that little dab of illumination from disturbing him.

The floor near his bed darkened quickly to a sooty black in an area about a meter across, and Raven rose up out of it. Quickly she moved to his head, gently placed her hands on either temple, and a soft blue glow enveloped him. Only a few seconds later, her eyes widened in shock and she took a step back, melting once more into the floor.

#

"Whaddaya mean it ain't him?"

Raven cocked an irritated eye at Cyborg and answered, "Was I not speaking clearly? Did I slip into Azarathean for a moment?"

"It's not that, Raven," said Robin in a calming voice. "It's just surprising. If that isn't Kid Flash, then who is it?"

"I have no idea. I didn't stay in his mind long enough to find out. But although he _**has**_ suffered a head injury and _**has**_ recently undergone surgery, he is very definitely _**not**_ Wally West."

Starfire floated over in front of the empath. "But … but where is our friend if he is not in the hospital?"

"That's a damn good question, little lady." Victor was pacing now. "We gotta find him."

"I think the main question would be who made the switch and how," observed Robin. "That was Kid Flash on the video, and Kid Flash who was loaded into the ambulance." He turned to Cyborg. "We'll need to go over any surveillance videos that might have been shot of the path the ambulance took." Looking then at Beast Boy, he continued, "Do you think you can pick up his scent from the scene of the fight?"

"You know it! I'll track him down!"

"Get on it, then."

Cyborg said, "I'll get a list of all the different video cameras between the fight scene and the hospital."

Raven volunteered, "I'll snoop around the hospital and see if I can find out who knows what. Maybe someone on staff is in on it."

Starfire glanced between them all, a worried look on her pretty face. "But … but how may I be of aid?"

"You come with me, Star," answered Robin confidently. "We have a lot of leg work to do."

##

_* * Edna's base, 11:40am CST * *_

"Can we pleeeeeease break for lunch? I'm starving!"

"Oh, very well. You seem to have developed somesing vaguely resembling competence wiss ze flight mode. I suppose it would not hurt to eat now."

Jinx didn't bother to mask her sarcasm. "Well, thanks, I guess." She was used to difficult task masters. After the H.I.V.E Academy Mistress, and then Brother Blood, and Madame Rouge, Edna really wasn't too bad. But she was satisfied with nothing less than perfection, and if that meant going through a routine forty-five times, then that's what they would do. "What's on the menu?"

A quick check of her data pad resulted in, "Bean soup, meatloaf, squash casserole, and a fruit salad."

Never one to be a picky eater (spending enough time alone on the streets will do that for a body) Jinx enthusiastically agreed to the menu.

"Well," said Edna with an off-handed wave, "you know where ze dining room is."

The girl took off like a gazelle.

Edna shouted after her, "And chew your food zis time!"

Once she was sure Jinx was out of earshot, Edna pulled out a tight-beam hand-held communication unit and hit three numbers.

The voice that picked up said, "Well it's about damn time!"

"Patience, dahling, what have I told you about patience?"

"Fuck patience! This guy's metabolism is like nothing I've ever seen before! He's goin' through painkillers like freakin' popcorn!"

Edna frowned at that. "The autodoc should have …"

"The autodoc ran out!"

_Ran out? Damn!_ "What is his status, zen?"

"He's on the mend. I'd say he's outta danger now, but his brain scans are still wonky."

"Are you sure zat is not simply his basal state?"

"…"

"Ah-ha! You do _**not**_ know!"

"I'll check a few things."

"Be sure you do. It would not be well for anysing to happen to zat young man. I feel zat Jinx's suit is very nearly on ze cusp."

"Okay. She's comin' along, then?"

"Marvelously so."

"That's good to know. We can't afford for this to take too much …"

"I believe I was ze one who explained ze time pressure of our mission to you, was I not?"

"Ah … ha. Yeah. Right."

"Call me when he comes out of his coma."

"Yes'm."

Edna Mode put the device away and went to join Jinx at lunch.

##

_* * Plaza Hotel, Keystone City, 4:10pm CST * *_

Cyborg pointed a triumphant finger at the monitor. "See? See? I was right! That shit is off the hook!"

The five teens crowded around the portable unit. This was nothing like as sophisticated as the setup Victor maintained at the Tower, but it was leagues beyond anything available locally.

Beast Boy huffed a sigh of relief. "So I _wasn't_ crazy and my senses _weren't_ lying to me. He really _did_ disappear once they got to the hospital."

"No, Green Bean, you were right on target."

Robin shook his head. "This only muddies the waters, though. Who in the hell is that … that …"

"Exactly," Raven nodded in agreement. "Is she a villain or a hero? That would depend upon what she wanted with Kid Flash."

Starfire asked, "Would you please run the recording again from the time the ambulance met the block of road?"

"Sure thing, little lady."

"Can you run the two feeds simultaneously?" asked Robin.

"Yeah, sure. We all have good eyesight, and the screen ain't that small."

Cyborg had unearthed a gold mine of information, although much of it added to their confusion rather than relieving it.

There were four surveillance cameras along the path the ambulance took, and one of them, a parking lot monitor camera, was aimed directly at the piece of road where the assault took place. They had seen the hastily-erected barrier being put up, and two men donning orange construction vests just a few seconds before the vehicle sped down that street.

In addition, the ambulance itself had a camera in the back. (Robin didn't _**even**_ want to know how Victor had managed to secure that tape!) It showed the two paramedics working on Wally, talking with each other and giving one another worried looks. Those looks intensified when the ambulance screeched to a halt.

Then things really heated up. One of the orange-clad imposters trotted up to the cab, jerked open the door, and shot the driver in the face. Meanwhile, three other men had run up to the back of the ambulance, threw those doors open, and fired a brief spray of AK47 rounds into the interior. Both paramedics fell, dead before they hit the floor. While his compatriots kept watch outside, one of the gunmen climbed up into the ambulance and aimed at Kid Flash … but just before he pulled the trigger, he was surrounded by a faintly sparkling lavender glow. His bullets, instead of puncturing Wally, bounced around inside the glowing ball and ended up in the gunman. The glow winked out and he slumped to the floor.

Outside, the parking lot camera showed that the orange-clad men were moving toward the rear of the ambulance when they stopped suddenly, struggled very briefly with something that smashed them together, and then simply disappeared.

"Too freakin' weird," commented Beast Boy.

"Heard that," agreed Victor

A few seconds later, one of the last two men edged toward the ambulance and peered inside. He jerked in shock and called to the other man, who started his way. But then the glowing lavender effect showed up again, the two men were slammed into each other, and they disappeared as well.

Robin looked at Raven. "Magic, you think?"

"I don't know what to think."

"Well _that's_ noncommittal."

"If I don't have enough information to form a theory, I don't form a theory."

"Hmm." He turned back to the screen.

Something – some force – was speedily dragging the driver back to the rear of the ambulance. The last remaining gunman was yanked unceremoniously onto the pavement, and the driver floated up onto the other narrow bed. The image from the inside camera clearly showed his head wound, which apparently had not been fatal. Then the interloper faded into existence.

She was thin, obviously female, and of somewhat below average height. Covered completely in black to the neck, a matching domino mask partially hid her pale face, but her long, lustrous black hair hung free. With an extreme economy of motion, she stripped Kid Flash out of his uniform and put it on the driver, then donned the driver's clothes. Then she glanced out the back of the ambulance, gestured briefly, and (on the parking lot camera) the watching teens saw the last gunman squish up in a ball and then vanish.

"That's just _gotta_ be magic!"

"No, Victor, it doesn't have to be," opined Raven. "She could be a remote teleporter."

"And what's with the weird glow?"

"I don't know. Why do Starfire's starbolts glow green? It's just an aspect of her power. This could be the same."

"So why," Beast Boy wanted to know, "did she 'port the bad guys but not the paramedics?"

"That, I can't say."

Robin rubbed a finger along his chin speculatively. "Perhaps … out of respect?"

"Respect?" Beast Boy asked.

"Maybe. We don't know that they're being teleported. She may be disintegrating them."

Raven tapped Victor's shoulder. "Back it up to where the guy was aiming at Kid Flash."

He did, and they watched the sequence.

"Do it again."

He gave her a look, but complied.

She said, "Stop it … there!" Then she pointed at the screen. "Okay, those bullets are ricocheting off something. It acts like when I use my soul-self as a shield. Maybe she can generate powerful force fields."

"Whoo. That's formidable," responded Robin.

Raven held up her hands. "I'm not saying one way or another. But you wanted a theory, and the evidence would seem to indicate that."

He nodded. "Thanks. Okay, Cyborg," he added, rubbing his hands together, "go back to where we left off."

They watched while she completed the clothing transfer. Then she hopped out the back, closed the doors, and apparently got the ambulance moving again. A couple of minutes later the doors opened once more and she climbed back in. Then she touched Wally and they both vanished. A few seconds later a young woman stuck her head in the back, saw the dead paramedics, and screamed bloody murder. Then people swarmed over the scene.

"Do you suppose," asked Starfire, "that the hospital personnel believe the injured driver to be Kid Flash?"

"It's possible. Coincidentally, he's a redhead, too. That may be what gave … that other girl the idea of switching them."

"But why would she bother?" objected Raven. "Why go to the trouble?"

"Yeah," agreed Victor, "what's her angle?"

Robin just shook his head. "I have no clue. Not one." He looked up and made sure he had their attention. "But I'll bet you hard cash that it's connected to that woman who took Jinx."

. . .

. . .

. . .

**A/N: Yeah, I wasn't expecting this either. But I have a pretty good idea now of where it's going, and it makes me happy.**

**Kindly read & review.**

**Concolor**


	6. Healed

**Bespoke**

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. . .

. . .

_Disclaimer Of Standardness: DC & Warner own the Titans. Disney/Pixar owns The Incredibles. I realize no pelf from writing fan-fiction, and I assume the above-named entities are aware of that fact and will not try to sue me for something I don't have._

. . .

. . .

. . .

**Chapter Six**

_* * Friday 21 August, 11:35pm CST * *_

Normally I wake up suddenly. In a flash, you might say. Probably a side effect of my metabolism. Not that I don't like to just lie around in bed of a morning, but if I do, it'll be while I'm awake. Anyhow, my mind can't stay still (sort of like my feet), and I'll start going over my Big List o' Things To Do Today. Keystone City depends on me, and even though my uncle sometimes says he doesn't think so or I don't act like it, I really do take that seriously. It just doesn't take me very long to do my rounds. You know, like … a minute? If I amble. So I end up doing my rounds several times a day, but even comin' at it that way I miss a lot. Sometimes I wonder if the criminals have some kind of Kid Flash detector. Still, I get lucky often enough to make it worth my while.

But I digress. This time I didn't wake up suddenly. It was a long, slow climb up a really fuzzy slope with occasional flickers of light coming in from random directions. I was very confused, I couldn't remember what had happened before I went to sleep, and my various senses kept phasing in and out. Also, there was pain. A lot of it. My head was a throbbing geyser that periodically sprayed my brains in random directions, and when I reached the point of being approximately self-aware, I had to wonder if it had been worth it.

My arms felt like they weighed two hundred kilos. Each. Just clenching my hand –I did that in reaction to one _**really**_ bad spike of agony behind my right ear – was a ridiculously monumental effort. Lift them? I don't think so.

For some reason I couldn't move my legs. I don't know if that's because I couldn't dredge up the energy, or I couldn't feel 'em. Didn't matter. I hurt too bad to care.

Some kind of pasty glue seemed to cover my eyes, and opening them was just waaaay too much trouble. But I could hear someone moving around my … bed? Was I in my bed? It was … warm … but …

Something … cool …

… cool … in my … arm …

… … cool … …

#

Violet scurried around the small room, frantically manipulating various meters to keep Kid Flash's pain signatures below permanently-damaging levels. The auto-doc had been designed to treat "normal" humans and certain types of supers, but in the first place it didn't seem to work as well in this dimension as it did in her home dimension, and in the second place this Wally West was _**significantly**_ more powerful than the vast majority of supers that she knew. The upper limits of its calibration should have been sufficient to induce a coma, but it was barely even denting his pain, much less keeping him sedated. She had to do that manually, with the IV drip she'd installed in the back of his left hand.

_At least the 'doc can keep track of what's wrong with him._ She thought wryly. _Thank God for small favors. _ Again she went over the system readouts. The boy (yes, boy, he couldn't possibly be twenty yet) had been severely injured in the attack, with several organs and his spine badly damaged. He'd been on a respirator in the ambulance, but they hadn't yet managed to stanch the internal bleeding. She felt sure that, even with his hyperactive metabolism, if she hadn't gotten him into the autodoc when she did, he would have died. And according to Edna, that couldn't be allowed to happen.

Once more, as she had at least a hundred times since arriving in this crazy place, she wished that Edna wouldn't play her cards quite so close to her chest.

Finally satisfied that he wasn't going to die of shock, she flipped her communicator open and pressed "1".

Edna answered on the second ring. "Is he awake?"

"No, E, he's still in too much pain. And I'm running out of sedatives."

"Again? How is zis possible?"

"Hey, _**you're**_ the one who said there might be calibration problems with the autodoc! Does it feel good to be right all the time?"

That drew a _harrrrumph_ from the tiny woman. "Be zat as it may, Vi, how can his system …"

"Because he's Kid Flash! He can run around the _**world**_ in a few seconds. He can vibrate through solid objects. Come on, you already know all this! According to his fan site, he eats enough for eight men in a typical day. Edna, these supers are Not Like Us. They are _**way**_ more powerful. You know my brother is the fastest guy on our world, and Kid Flash could braid his hair and paint a landscape on his forehead before Dash even knew he was there. And that doesn't even _**touch**_ the major heroes like Superman or Wonder Woman or the Martian Manhunter or that Green Lantern fellow. Those people scare the livin' shit outta me!"

The diminutive designer sighed deeply. "Very well. I will get you some more sedatives." She paused before continuing, "Does ze 'doc give you any idea of how soon he will be healed?"

"I thought so at first, but now I'm just not so sure." Something occurred to her and she snapped her fingers. "Hey, in my research on these 'Titans' – boy, now _**there's**_ some truth in advertising – it mentioned that the one called Raven is reputed to be able to heal wounds. How about if we get in touch with her and get her to come and see what she can do?"

Edna hesitated. "Ze timing could get very tricky."

"How'd Jinx do today?"

"Amazingly well, all sings considered. She continues to charge ze suit as long as she wears it, and I suspect ze Union will occur in ze next day or two."

"And she still doesn't know Kid Flash is …"

"Of course not! Do you sink for a moment zat she would stay here wiss me if she had any idea her lover was so gravely injured? Do not be ridiculous."

"Okay, okay, don't get your knickers in a twist. But if she's close to Union, why can't I go ahead and contact this Raven character? Really, what harm could it do?"

"We do not know yet ze extent to which Jinx's hex power will affect ze suit. It could be … quite somesing to see. It may catch ze attention of ze Titans, since zey are in Keystone at present."

"Yeah … okay. But isn't that all the more reason to get Kid Flash well as soon as possible?"

"… You make a compelling argument, dahling."

Violet breathed a small sigh of relief. She'd been on enough missions with Edna to know that if she was using that term, it meant she was feeling more confident about their situation. "I'll go ahead and sneak over to their hotel."

"Be careful, Vi. As you stated earlier, zey are very powerful and may be very dangerous if provoked."

"Provoking is the farthest thing from my mind."

"See zat it stays zere."

##

_* * Saturday 22 August, 01:05am CST * *_

Starfire had talked Raven into sharing a room. Each of the boys had his own room (Victor needed space for his charging station, and neither he nor Robin cared to bunk with Beast Boy) and now the dark Titan was regretting her choice. It isn't that she didn't want to be around the Tamaranean … well, okay, maybe it was, sort of. She liked the voluble alien, really she did. The problem was that a little of Starfire went a long way in Raven's book. She'd chattered about anything and everything until past midnight when Robin had come by to make sure they would go to sleep so they'd be properly rested. Raven hadn't meditated in almost forty hours, and the lack was beginning to wear at her. So now she floated, comfortably in the lotus position, her mantra coming quietly between relaxed lips every few minutes.

Nearly a year earlier she had learned the trick of falling into Nevermore without the aid of her mind-mirror, and now she did that every second or third time she meditated. It certainly helped, especially if she had a knotty problem to chew on. All of her Emotions enjoyed getting in on the act (even Rage now and then, if Raven brought something with her that the demonic Emotion could rip to shreds) and were frequently of aid in giving her some perspective.

This time it was Bravery that had requested a council meeting, so they were in her demesne, sitting around a blazing fire in a dim clearing in the huge, dark forest she preferred. Swirling her voluminous, green cape, she stalked back and forth in front of the fire pumping her fist. "We should go find them! Let none hinder us!"

"An excellent idea," countered Intelligence, "which would be made possible if we knew where they were."

"Jinx can _**stay**_ lost for all I care," said Rudeness, as she examined the contents of her nose.

Raven snorted at that. "Not that I necessarily disagree with you, but Wally seems to be quite smitten with her. I'm sure he would account it a great favor if we were to recover her."

Rudeness was unimpressed. "Whatever." She rolled onto her side, presenting her back to the fire, and pulled her cloak over her head.

Pointing an accusatory finger at Raven, Bravery asserted, "_**You**_ can find them! If they are in this city, you can find them!"

"And if they are not?" objected Intelligence. "What then? They were teleported. They don't necessarily have to be on this _**planet**_ anymore."

"We must make the effort! Kid Flash is a Titan! He deserves our utmost exertion! No one gets left, no one gets forgotten!"

Rudeness blew a raspberry, then farted for real, then said, "You sound like a bumper sticker."

Timid piped up, "Someone is coming."

The rest of them stopped, listening. Raven said, "Intelligence, go stand by Rage's door. Be ready." And she vanished …

… and opened her eyes in the room. It was pitch dark, but that was no barrier to sight for one with demon blood. However, no one could be seen. Nevertheless …

"You should show yourself before I do something you'll deeply regret."

Violet faded into visibility. "Sorry. You're Raven, right?"

The dark Titan allowed a bit of her soul-self to seep into the floor. She could sense no ill will coming from the intruder, so she didn't immediately attack her. "Who wants to know?"

"Um … look, my name's … um … well, okay, my _**name**_ is Violet. Violet Parr. I was the one who saved Kid Flash from …"

"Yes, I saw you."

"… You … you _**saw**_ me? How did …"

"Why are you here, Violet Parr?"

Violet had very seldom felt as threatened as she did at that second. The even monotone Raven used was unnerving to begin with, and coupled with the fact that she couldn't count on her invisibility to help protect her … "I need, that is, I _**think**_ I need your help."

"My help."

"Uh, yeah."

"In what respect?"

"I understand that you are something of a healer."

"When circumstances require it. What of it?"

"Kid Flash was injured very badly. I got him into the autodoc, but …"

"The what?"

"Ah … autodoc. It's a sort of self-contained hospital. But it's not helping him as much as I thought it would."

"Where is he?"

"At Edna's place."

"Is that supposed to tell me something?"

"I'm sorry! It's in the north part of the city, in the Idlewild neighborhood."

The empath considered that briefly. "Can you fly?"

"Ah … well, not as such. I can sort of mimic it, but …"

"How did you get into my room?"

"Oh. I teleported." She pulled out her recall unit. "I can get us back that way if you like."

"If there's any teleporting to be done, I will do it." Her soul-self leapt from the floor and engulfed the startled woman. A bare second later they erupted over the community in question, some three hundred meters in the air, Violet still held tightly in an inky tendril, but now shivering violently from contact with the null-space the empath used for transport. Raven said, "Where?"

Violet's eyes were huge. This girl was even more powerful than she'd been led to believe! And she was still a teenager! _Please let me live long enough to get back home,_ she thought fervently, _and I will never more roam from my own dimension!_

Raven, however, picked up on that thought, Violet being in rather close proximity to her mind, and brought the woman around face to face. "What dimension are you from?"

And Violet had thought she couldn't be more shocked. "Did you _read_ my _**mind?"**_

"Answer the question."

"Uh … it's parallel to this one. I came with Edna. She's the one that knows how to navigate. I'm just the, uh … the … flunky, I guess." She was going to say 'the muscle' but that seemed somehow inappropriate, given her current position.

"And who might Edna be?"

"She's a fashion designer."

"…"

"She also designs super suits."

Raven, never slow on the uptake, asked, "Is that where Jinx got her new outfit?"

"Uh … well, no."

"… No?"

"No, see, there's this local doctor …"

Raven held up a hand. "Save it. Where is Kid Flash?"

Violet surveyed the array of streetlights below and pointed hesitantly. "Over … there. I think."

"You think?"

"Hey, I've only been here a few days! And I haven't seen the neighborhood from this angle, either. Cut me some slack."

No response was forthcoming, but they dropped toward the street Violet had indicated. The trip was rather more abrupt than she liked. She hoped her stomach would catch up with her soon.

"Which one?"

"4810."

They flew down the street for a couple of blocks and stopped in front of a large, multi-storey building. "This?"

"Uh-huh."

Raven set them on the ground. "You will deactivate the security system."

"Um … there's, ah, not really what you'd call a security system. Not on the whole place, that is. Edna has something on her lab, but the main unit just has a lock and a burglar alarm."

A highly-cocked eyebrow showed what Raven thought of that. "What, exactly, are you doing here? Did you target Kid Flash specifically?"

"Target? No! Hell, no! I was following Jinx because Edna needed to help her with her suit."

"But you said this Edna person didn't make the suit."

"She didn't. The doctor …"

"Right. Never mind." She held out a hand toward the building. "After you."

About a minute later they walked into the medical bay. Raven went over to where Wally lay and circled the unit a couple of times, studying the setup. "This is extremely advanced tech."

"Hey, don't thank me. This is all Edna's doing."

"Is this 'Edna' from your dimension, too?"

"Yeah. She's an old family friend. Made super suits for all of us."

Raven turned to face her. "All of you?"

"My family. We're all supers."

"Supers. You mean metahumans?"

"Eh. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to. People with unusual powers are referred to as supers where I come from." She pointed at Kid Flash. "So can you heal him?"

"I will see." Going around to his head, she reached down into the unit and placed her hands on either temple. A soft, blue glow extended from the dark girl to slowly cover Wally's head and torso.

"Cool."

"Shh."

"Sorry."

#

I hate being confused. Given that fact, you'd think I'd do more about it. But the truth is that although I have a nearly perfect memory, I'm really not all that good at applying what I know to a given situation. It's something my uncle harps on constantly, and he's been repeating himself for about two years now. Since Jinx teamed up with me, though, things have gotten a lot better. Yeah, she's kinda random most of the time, but she's really good at coming up with workable plans on the fly. We're a good combo. I keep hopin' she'll realize we could be a combo in other ways besides just fighting crime.

I think I've been unconscious. Again. That's another thing I hate. When you've been knocked out, whether it's from some goofy gas or getting a konk on the kopf, you never know how much time has passed or what somebody may have drawn on your face. Mas and Menos may have this cutesie public image and all, but trust me, they have a totally deviant sense of humor.

I'm picking up one plus already: no pain to speak of. My neck's a little sore, yeah, and I still feel kinda heavy, but the Towering Inferno that was my head the last time just isn't there. I open my eyes.

And close 'em again. If there's one person who gets on Raven's nerves worse than BB, I'm it. And I'm not really up to …

"Wally, I know you're awake. Cut the crap."

_Aaaaand_ there we are. I look up at her, and notice that she seems to be sweating. Never a good sign. "Um, hi, Raven."

"How do you feel?"

"Sore." I roll my shoulders around a little, try a few experimental stretches. "Stiff. How long was I out?"

"Approximately thirty-three hours."

"Ouch." I sat up, slowly because I didn't want to get all woozy in front of Raven, and worked my neck back and forth. "That's not my record, but it's pretty bad." My stomach growled, and suddenly those thirty-three hours meant something else entirely. "Damnation! I'm, like, totally hollow! Is there anything to eat around here?"

Raven tossed a glance at Violet, who jerked up and said, "Be right back!" and scampered out of the room. Turning back to me, she asked, "What do you recall about your injury?"

"… um … injury?"

"What did you think knocked you out?"

"Right! Right. Okay." I thought hard. "The last thing I remember … uh … lemme see … I guess that would be … talking with Jinx about her … uh, her … um …"

Noting my sudden reluctance, Raven prompted, "Her suit, possibly?"

I blinked at her. "How'd you …"

"Apparently a lot happened that you don't recall. Your apartment complex was attacked, then you and Jinx, primarily Jinx, fought them. Do you remember any of that?"

I racked my brain, but came up empty. "… I'm gonna have to go with 'no'. What happened?"

"MS13 happened. They had three heavy APCs. You got knocked off your feet by a rocket, ricocheted off a power pole, and crashed into a wall. Serious internal injuries."

_Holy shit!_ "Oh."

"Violet – that's the woman who I assume will shortly be bringing you some food – was following Jinx and …"

I had a sudden panic attack. "Jinx!"

"… Yes?"

"Is she okay?"

"As far as I know."

"Did she get hurt?"

"Jinx was the one who did the hurting. When you got injured, she apparently freaked out and hit the APCs with the most massive hex blast I ever saw. Destroyed all three of them."

I had to stop a minute to absorb that. "Destroyed?"

"Totally?"

"What about the guys in 'em?"

"Dead."

Shit. Not good. She's never killed anyone before. And I made her put on the suit after she as much as _**told**_ me it was messing with her hexes … "Where is she?"

"I haven't a clue. When you got hit, after she …"

"How'd I get hit?"

"You were carrying Jinx, and there was a rocket involved. Remember? I said that already."

"Oh. Yeah, you did."

"So, after she took out the APCs, she ran over to help you, but this other woman showed up. They talked for a few seconds and then the woman – who I imagine is this 'Edna' that Violet keeps mentioning – took her hand and they vanished."

"What do you mean, vanished?"

"Teleported. Same as you."

"… Same as me?"

"Violet has a teleportation device. After Jinx disappeared, the police and the paramedics got there and started working on you. They put you into the ambulance, but they got waylaid on the way to the hospital. MS13 again, we figure. There were five of them. They shot the driver, killed the paramedics, and were about to kill you when Violet showed up. She either teleported or disintegrated the gangsters, we aren't really sure which, and then swapped clothes around, dressing the driver in your suit and herself in the driver's uniform. She drove to the hospital and then teleported away with you."

That, I thought, was completely crazy. "Why the hell did she drive to the hospital?"

"We think it was to convince the hospital staff that you were still in the ambulance."

She was making my head hurt. "But, why?"

"My assumption is that it was a plan to protect you by making everyone think you were gravely injured and in the hospital. Of course, you _**were**_ gravely injured. But if everyone thought you were there, no one would be looking for you elsewhere.'

A **LOT** of questions occurred to me, so I grabbed one as it floated by. "How do you know all this?"

"Security tapes."

Oh. "Lemme guess: Victor?"

That almost pulled a smile onto her face. Almost. "Of course."

"Naturally. Okay, then, what about …" I was interrupted by Violet coming back in with a large tray loaded down with sandwiches. My cavernous stomach reminded me that I'd been neglecting it, so I dug in. Thirty seconds later I presented the bug-eyed woman with an empty platter and said, "Any more?"

She slowly nodded, took the platter, and trotted out. I covered a burp and continued, "What about Jinx? If she realized that she killed those guys, she's gonna be nine kinds of torn up about it."

"That was our assumption as well."

"So … do you know where this 'Edna' might be lurking?"

"In this building somewhere I suppose. Violet referred to it as 'Edna's place', and mentioned that she had a lab here."

That was disquieting. "A lab? What kind of lab?"

"For making super suits? That would be my guess, if pressed."

"So if Edna took Jinx, wouldn't she be here, too?"

"That's possible."

"Can you … you know … look for her?"

The girl sighed. "She has a most unique mental signature, that I will admit. But Violet interrupted the first meditation I'd had in a day and a half to drag me over here and heal you. The healing took a lot out of me. Your spine was damaged. I need some time to myself before I do anything as delicate astral investigation, and that's what would be required to find her if she is asleep. And at this wee hour of the morning, I feel sure she is." She took a step back. "The rest of the Titans are all sleeping. You've been unconscious for quite some time, so you probably don't need to sleep right now, but that would make you unique among present company. So, you have a choice now: do you want to stay here and look for Jinx, or come back to our hotel? I would mention that your apartment is essentially totaled."

Well, crap. "Totaled, huh?"

"The entire building is cordoned off. From the looks of it, it will have to be demolished."

"Shit. Stupid gangsters."

"Yes. We are expecting there to be further retaliation for the deaths. But Robin was convinced it wouldn't happen until tomorrow, and insisted we all get some rest. I intend to meditate for an hour or so and then sleep."

"I'll stay here."

"I thought you might." She took out her T-Com and tossed it to me. "We'll call you in a few hours. Oh, and you might want to see about replacing your uniform. The one you were wearing is at Bell Memorial, but it's ripped and dirty." She nodded at me. "And that hospital gown doesn't really make a heroic statement."

That's when I realized, finally, that all I was wearing was the gown she mentioned. I fought down a blush. "Good idea."

"Do you have extras?"

I nodded.

She answered my nod with one of her own. "Until later, then." And she wrapped herself in darkness and sank into the floor.

Violet came back in lugging a big box. "I emptied … hey, where's Raven?"

"She left." Eyeing the box with salivary glands in overdrive, I asked, "What's in there?"

"Most of what we had in the fridge. If it's not enough, there's a 24-hour taco place not far from here."

I scarfed up the half-a-chicken, eight dinner rolls, and four Tupperware containers of vegetables, then polished off the five pieces of (really good!) pecan pie. Then I asked, "Is Jinx here?"

"Um … well … yeah. But …"

"Where is she? Is she okay? Does she know about the men she killed?"

"Ah … well, as to that, I think she does. She hasn't talked about it as far as I know."

"Have you talked to her?"

"No, just Edna. They're working to get her suit under her control."

I got the distinct impression that she was holding some information back. "Would you take me to her?"

She bit her lip. "I don't think I'm supposed to."

"Look," I said, "there are two ways this can go. You can take me to her. Or I can find her myself. There's no Plan C."

"Okay." She slumped a little. "Edna's gonna be pissed at me, but right now I'm too tired to care. Taking care of you was a 'round-the-clock job and I just wanna go to bed."

I nodded. "Lead the way."

We took an elevator up four floors and walked down two long halls to a door that looked exactly like thirty or forty others we'd passed. Violet said, "That's her room. Do whatever you like. I'll see you in the morning." And she went back the way we'd come.

I turned to face the door …

. . .

. . .

. . .

**A/N: I promise it won't be too much longer before things start making sense. Just hang in there and Trust Me. (And I'm not even here from the Federal Government!)**

**Please let me know your thoughts on the story.**

**Concolor**


	7. Relieved

**Bespoke**

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_Disclaimer: The only characters I own in this story are the various incidentals (the doctor, the inventor, etc.) and I don't make any money off any of it. So please don't sue. With two kids and a wife in college, I Gots No Moola._

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**Chapter Seven**

_* * Saturday 22 August, 01:17am CST * *_

I turned to face the door …

… and I stopped. Jinx was on the other side. According to Violet, she was fine. Healthy, unharmed, even being taught some more about her suit by a famous fashion designer. (And just where the hell did _that_ come from?)

Her suit. Mentally cursing the thing, I tossed in a few creative epithets for myself. She had _**told**_ me it was screwing with her hexes. She _**told**_ me it made her uncomfortable. But did I listen? Who, me? Do I ever?

Shit.

What if she blamed me for causing those guys' deaths? I made her put it on. Technically, it was my fault. I mean, they were MS13, so it's not like they never did anything to deserve it, and they were trying to kill us, and …

Stop it, Wally. You're being stupid again. You're a hero. You don't kill people.

But neither does she. And I knew that had to be bothering her. Knowing the national media, they'd be more than happy to see to it that she _stayed_ bothered. Stinkin' parasites.

I thought furiously for a few seconds (that's real time … subjectively, I tossed the subject around in my mind for a good two hours) but couldn't come up with a quick solution for her problem. I knew good and damn well that a citizen – probably several – got the fight on camera, and our local news people are fast. It was probably on all the late-late shows. Likely made Letterman's Top Ten. _'… the Top Ten reasons why Jinx should be deported to Antarctica …'_

Sons o' bitches.

Cut it _**out**_, Wally. Just … just don't. All that woolgathering wasn't doing you or her any good.

I looked at the door again. Would she even talk to me? She'd had … let's see … thirty-odd hours to come up with a good, long list of reasons never to see me again. Not that I'd blame her. But to tell the truth, I think that would kill me.

I could claim ignorance! I was just trying to keep her safe, to protect her from the hail of lead those gangsters were sending at us. She might buy that. Maybe. If I begged hard enough.

Hey.

Oh, hell. Hell's freakin' bells!

What about the Justice League? Technically, we're under their guidance. If they thought she's some kind of loose cannon …

Damn.

Damn, damn, double damn. All my fault.

Hell, deportation would be a _cakewalk_ next to what _they'd_ do to her.

Maybe … maybe we could skip the country?

I leaned my head against the door, trying to regulate my breathing. Telling myself that I was overreacting.

And maybe I was. But I couldn't be sure.

Squaring my shoulders, I put my hand on the knob. Step one was facing the music. I had to know how much she hated me and whether there was anything I could do to salvage it.

The room was dark, but there was a faint glow leaking out from under the door to what I assumed was the bathroom pretty much straight ahead. Her bed – a standard double – was against the left wall. A small closet stood open, a meter or so to the left of the bathroom, and between that and the bed was a small dresser with a mirror at the back. Plenty of light leaked in from the hall, but I didn't really want to leave the door open. You know, just in case.

I closed the door, then locked it just to be safe. If she started hexing me, I didn't want any innocent bystanders hurt (not that there was a lot of traffic, but that's what I told myself). Then I went over to the bathroom and opened the door a hand-span or so, letting enough light in to see by (a little).

Approaching the bed, I had to stop and just look at her for a minute. I hadn't seen her asleep all that often, which was why the memories meant so much to me. That's the only time she ever really relaxed. If she was awake, she was always busy, always doing something, usually guarded and usually on edge. Not that I blamed her. The H.I.V.E. wasn't totally out of commission, and there _was_ a bounty on her. We caught two bounty hunters in the last three months who were carrying papers stating that she was worth $150,000 if delivered alive. I wanted to go take care of that problem before things got any hotter, but she …

I was wasting time. Stalling.

But she's just so damn beautiful! Those eyes! I could get lost _forever_ in those incredible eyes. I have to remember sometimes when I'm watching her to tell my lungs when they're supposed to work. And that unremittingly graceful dancer's build, and that long, delicate neck, and …

But hell, she could be a total dowd and I would still love her. She's so exciting, so different from any other girl. She had me at "Losers!"

Sighing again, I knelt by the bed. She looked so peaceful. She didn't deserve to be awakened like this in the middle of the night, and I didn't deserve such a perfect girlfr…

_Girlfriend?_ Seriously? Where did that come from? And just who did I think I was kidding? She'd never admitted to **_any_ **feelings for me beyond a sort of prickly friendship. And I'd been too much of a chicken to really talk about the way I felt.

_So don't go chickenshit now!_ my brain whispered to me.

I leaned over, lightly and carefully brushed some of that gorgeous pink froth away from her face, and rested my hand on her shoulder.

"Jinx?" It was probably the quietest word I'd ever breathed.

I knew she was a light sleeper. Being brought up in the H.I.V.E. Academy for Exceptional Young People will do that to a body. But she didn't even stir. This 'Edna' must have _**really**_ worn her out.

"Jinx." It was a shade louder, but still just above a murmur. And this time she did move a little, and draw a short breath, and tuck a hand under her pillow.

"Jinxie?"

Her eyes popped open. She blinked at me twice, as if not believing what she saw …

… and then I got tackled.

I thought at first that she was going to just beat me up (or try to – I'm a LOT stronger than she is, even if I do let her get away with an appalling amount of abuse some days) but all she did was latch onto me and not let go.

At some point I realized she was hugging me. And that freaked me out.

"Jinx? You okay?"

"God, Wally, I thought you were**_ dying!"_** She craned her head back up far enough to look me in the eye (she had me flat on my back, her slight weight splayed out along my body) and continued, "You are _**not**_ allowed to die! You hear me? You understand what I mean, buster?"

That sounded like the Jinx I knew and I had to pull a relieved grin. "Yes, ma'am, Miz Jinx, ma'am!"

She tucked her head back into the crook of my neck, never having eased up her death grip on me a millimeter, and set in to muttering, "Worry me half to death. Go and get yourself all banged up without so much as a by-your-leave. Think you can just get hit with a rocket and jump back up and dust yourself off. Not Superman, you stupid, stupid boy. Gotta be more careful. Taking too fuckin' many chances, an' I can't be there to pull your nuts outta the fire ever' time. If you ever … if you was to … if … if you …"

I thought I heard a little catch in her throat, but I wasn't sure at first.

Wait. Was I hallucinating?

Jinx? _Crying?_

Jinx _**never**_ cried! I noticed then that my arms had already found their way up around her waist – her svelte, perfect waist – and I decided to leave them there (at least until she noticed and hexed 'em off).

"Jinxie? Are … are you all right?"

"hmph."

Freaking out again! That was the wrong thing to ask. She was definitely gonna hex me now! "I mean, sure you are! I didn't mean … of course you're fine. You're right, I'm just a stupid boy and …"

… and … I couldn't finish my sentence. Because she was kissing me.

Once I got past the shock, I thought right then and there that I could die happy.

She was … soft. So … damn … soft.

You might not think it to look at her, and definitely not just from listening to her, but her kiss was … was just … incredibly tender and gentle. Not limp, by any means! No, she was putting some power into that kiss! But on top of the resilience, covering the firmness underneath, was …

Satin.

Suede.

Rose petals.

And she tasted … so … sweet.

Damn.

I realized I was supposed to kiss her back (finally) and did. And it only got better and better.

She came up for air once, just for a second, and dove back in. And I figured out pretty soon after that, that we were gonna be okay.

Somehow I don't think she'll mind now if I start calling her my girlfriend.

##

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**A/N: Yes, it was pretty short (for me, anyhow) but that's what I wanted to cover, and I covered it. Kid Flash deserved a break after all the crap I put him through.**

**Kindly leave a review. They aren't NECESSARY to the continuation of the tale, but I really appreciate them. So thanks in advance.**

**Concolor**


	8. Informed

**Bespoke**

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_Disclaimer: _

_I don't own these characters; DC and Warner and Disney/Pixar do.  
I don't make money from these characters; DC and Warner and Disney/Pixar do.  
I don't make movies with these characters; DC and Warner and Disney/Pixar do.  
However, I do write stories about them, and this is one of those stories. It is just for fun (not profit) and has no bearing whatsoever on canon. And if you couldn't figure _**that**_ one out, I have some great swamp property I'd like to discuss with you over dinner. Your treat._

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**Chapter Eight**

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_* * Saturday 22 August, 07:15am CST * *_

By unanimous tacit agreement, the Titans met in Robin's room to do their planning. A lot of it had to be done flying blind: the local police department wanted nothing to do with them. With Kid Flash 'officially' out of action, it was as if they had circled the wagons in anticipation of another gangster attack.

The local television stations were blanketing the airwaves with constant reports of his condition, dissections of the attack, punditry about why the attack had taken place, what he had done wrong, what Jinx had done that caused his injury, or had not done that could have spared him the injury, why killing all the gangsters had been a good move, why killing any of them had guaranteed a disaster, when the next attack was likely to come, why the gangsters would not dare come back to Keystone, and on and on and on and on _**and on.**_ All of it was accompanied by more or less flattering photos of the two teens, depending on who was being shrill at the moment.

On the other hand, Cyborg wasn't able to determine whether or not the officials knew that the fellow in Bell Memorial's ICU wasn't really Wally West. As far as the public was aware, Kid Flash had been seriously injured and was in 'guarded but stable' condition, with the best doctors in the city attending to him. But that was pretty much it … 'officially'.

Since the ambulance driver had been shot in the face, comparisons with file photos wouldn't have done them much good anyway … but the driver was a good ten kilos heavier than the hero, so _**somebody**_ should have noticed how poorly his uniform fit. That was Starfire's position, anyway. Robin figured the medicos had likely stripped him out of his uniform the very first thing, and nobody in the ER would have had time to conduct a fashion inspection. But he certainly wasn't going to argue with the Tamaranean about it.

But then Robin, as was his habit, had been up for two hours already, going over every bit of information he could glean about the probable window for the next attack. That there would be one, he never doubted. That it would be today, he felt nearly certain. And now he had the other three (Raven hadn't made an appearance yet) grouped around the two additional monitors that Cyborg had set up, with him on one, and Starfire and Beast Boy on the other.

The shape-shifter piped up, "Looks like the Mayor put in a request for the National Guard."

Robin nodded. "He said he might. Is he serious?"

"Yes," answered the alien. "He put out a release of press to say so."

"Good," he grunted. "We can use the help."

"Do you truly feel that the criminals of gang affiliation will return? As Cyborg did point out, Jinx was able to 'hand them their asses' in a most spectacular manner."

"Yes, Star, I do. If these were normal crooks, I'd say not. They'd just crawl off and lick their wounds. But they aren't. They're a huge …"

"How would licking their wounds help if they are already dead? And even if they were not, that does not sound very sanitary."

_Sigh._ "It's just another figure of speech. Some animals tend to lick at sores on their bodies. It means the crooks would go into hiding and try to get, uh, reorganized. You know, patch their group back together. Anyway, these guys are huge, and between drug trafficking and contract killing and gun running, they have all the money they need for whatever mayhem they want to cause. Besides that, they are heavily invested in the whole concept of 'saving face'."

Her pretty forehead slightly scrunched in confusion, Starfire asked, "Do they have a problem with the maintenance of their faces?"

_**Egad**__, but she's being thick today!_ "It means … well, it's like a point of honor. When you say to someone, 'MS13 is coming,' that typically gets everyone up in alarm, and for good reason. They are a seriously dangerous bunch, and they work hard to maintain that reputation." He nodded decisively. "That group that got killed? That's just impetus for the rest of them to try harder. The next attack will be much worse."

Raven chose that moment to phase through floor beside the monitors, and right at Beast Boy's elbow. He gave a startled "eep!" and nearly fell off his chair. "Damn it, Rae, don't you ever knock? Rob coulda been changin' clothes for all you knew!"

She looked pointedly at the ornate clock on the wall above the bank of monitors and stated, "Per normal operating procedure, Robin will have been awake and engaged in his regular activities for some two hours by this point. I doubt he would have taken a mid-obsession time-out to switch uniforms."

Robin thought to himself, _Obsession? Come on, am I that predictable?_ But he acknowledged her entrance with a modicum of grace. "Good morning, Raven. Have you eaten?"

"No."

"So you just got up? Or were you meditating?"

"I meditated before I went to sleep. I just awakened some ten minutes ago."

That drew one of his eyebrows upward. "Sleeping in, are we? That's … unusual."

"I had a very late night."

"Truly!" agreed Starfire. "She was out for some time and did not return until early this morning!"

Robin's gaze tracked around to the alien. "And you didn't think this was important to share because …?"

She blinked at him innocently. "I assumed she was meditating, as she does with the great frequency. And she has just confirmed this, yes?"

Raven's monotone rolled over them. "No. I was away from the hotel during much of that time."

The rest of the Titans gave her their attention at that pronouncement. "Doin' what?" Cyborg wanted to know.

"I located Kid Flash."

It took the better part of two minutes for the uproar to die down to what she considered acceptable levels. Beast Boy required a judicious application of soul-self in the form of a gag, but didn't actually stop trying to talk until he received the full brunt of one of her Glares o' Doom. Clearing her throat delicately, she said, "If you can all bring yourselves to allow me to speak – _uninterrupted_ – I will brief you on the events of last night."

Almost in unison, the other four made 'zip the lip' motions and waited for her story. So she told them as much as she knew about Violet Parr, and Edna, and a parallel dimension, and Jinx and her suit, and the autodoc (in which Cyborg was mightily interested) and Kid Flash's broken back and her healing of him.

"So, you can find this place again?" Robin wanted to know.

She _almost_ sounded offended when she said, "Of course."

"We should go there as soon as possible and get Kid Flash up to speed on what we know."

"I would be careful of the Parr girl if I were you," countered Raven. "She is a metahuman – what she calls a 'super' – of unknown strength. Although she was very obviously frightened of me …"

"Shows she has some brains," muttered Beast Boy.

She gave him a glower. "Though she may have been frightened of me, I got the distinct feeling that she wouldn't have any trouble taking care of herself. And if what we saw on the security tapes was any indication, she would be extremely dangerous if cornered."

"Did you get any data on just what that effect is?" asked Robin.

A shake of the head gave her answer. "My theory is still that she can generate force fields. But I don't know if that is a metahuman ability or more of their tech, which seems rather more advanced than ours. They do, after all, travel between dimensions that way, and as far as I know the only way anyone in this dimension knows how to do that is via magic."

Cyborg shook his head. "Apokolips has the boom tubes. They can travel between dimensions."

"True enough. But in the first place, boom tubes are powered by The Source. And in the second place, The Source is at least partially magic-based."

"We'll ask her," interrupted Robin, cutting off their argument, "when we see her."

Raven just shrugged at that. "Fine. I'm going to make myself some tea and then meditate for a bit before I do anything else. But you four can go on over there if you want." She handed Robin a slip of paper with the address. "Just keep in mind that she and this 'Edna' person did save Kid Flash's life. Whatever else they may be, they harbor no animus toward us."

He quickly memorized it and passed it to Cyborg. "Raven, we've been monitoring the various news outlets. My deduction, given what we know about MS13, is that they _will_ attack again today, and it _will_ be considerably more extensive than that last foray."

"I would not disagree with that assessment." She recalled something then and gave a small, disgusted snort. "Ah … Wally has my T-Com. You can call him on it if you want. You probably should before barging in over there."

"He has your …! Why didn't you …"

She held up a slim hand. "Up late. Short night. Insufficient meditation. Just drop it."

Starfire put a concerned hand on her friend's shoulder. "Please, Raven, do your meditation and do not worry for us. We will meet with Jinx and Kid Flash and find a way to stop the criminals of gang."

The empath nodded and sank into the floor.

Robin was all business. "All right, Titans, looks like we have some of our agenda set now. Star, you carry me. Beast Boy, you carry Cyborg." He trotted out to the balcony. "This address puts our destination almost due northeast of here." He opened his T-Com and hit Raven's code. "I think Raven's idea of calling him first is a good one, though."

##

_* * Somewhat earlier * *_

There are those who accuse me of doing everything too quickly. Raven says I eat like a pack of starving hounds, that it wouldn't kill me to slow down and at least _pretend_ to be a part of the team when we have meals together, and that the way I do it is rude (I was smart enough at the time not to point out that she'd be the reigning expert on 'rude', 'cause unlike BB I don't care much for being tossed out windows). And maybe I am. But I need twelve thousand calories in a typical day, and twenty thousand or more if I do a lot of running. Her typical daily intake will be a bagel (dry), a small piece of broiled fish, maybe a stalk or two of celery or broccoli, and half a dozen cups of that nasty herbal tea. Some days it's just the tea. So maybe I can forgive her for not understanding.

Anyway, I wake up … well … okay, we went over that already. I'm asleep and then I'm awake, and there's no 'transition period'. No gradual onset of awareness, as Uncle Barry likes to call it. He tried to explain how people in our family (some of us) interact with the Dimension of Speed, but I think I'm gonna need some serious math under my belt before it makes any sense. 'cause it didn't. All I know is that my mental processes are speeded up as well. But it isn't what you'd call 'automatic'. Like, I have to concentrate to read or think at super speed. Only it isn't a hardship. It doesn't take a lot out of me. Just something I can do, know what I'm sayin'?

I'm getting off-track here. 'cause what happened was that I woke up in Jinx's bed.

I just lay there for a bit, kinda too shocked at my position to get a good handle on things, while I went over my memories from the night before. Jinx was snuggled up against me with her head on my chest. Even though it was August, Edna – whoever she is – apparently liked to keep it very cool inside, and Jinx, out of necessity, was sleeping under a blanket; that meant I was under it, too, now. She had her right arm over my stomach; her right hand had a light grip on the waistband of my sweatpants (I'd found those in the room with the autodoc, along with the tee-shirt I was currently wearing, so thanks, Edna, I guess). Her hair was down. It's actually kinda long, comes down to the bottom of her shoulder blades if she doesn't have it up in horns, and you would _**not**_ believe how soft it is. I think the horns only stay in place through magic, honestly. But I'd had damn few chances to run my fingers through it before, so I took the opportunity now.

She gave a tiny sigh in her sleep as my hand moved over her head. More memories crept up.

_. . . . . . . She finally pulled back, leaving both of us breathing hard, and stared directly into my eyes from a finger-length away. One of her hands was suddenly against my cheek, and I pressed into it a little. So soft! How does she stay so soft when she can hit so hard?_

"_Wally?"_

_I couldn't help it. I grinned. It was a stupid grin. The kind of grin that gets pulled onto your face when you find something really, really good, and you know it's yours now. The inflection in her voice was different from anything else I'd ever heard come out of her mouth. And even though she'd been asleep for a few hours, her breath was sweet … pure … intoxicating. I managed to answer her, but I don't remember exactly what I said. 'Yes' or 'Huh' or probably something equally intelligent. She'd disconnected my brain with those lips._

"_I was really worried about you."_

_I could tell. Boy, could I ever. "I won't say I'm not glad about that."_

"_You kissed me back."_

_She was changing the subject on me. I had to drag my brain around in that direction with both hands. "Uh … yeah. I did."_

"_Did you mean it?" . . . . . . ._

Had I **meant** it?

Was she **serious?**

I've been racking what little brain I possess for weeks and weeks to try to come up with some way to tell her how much she meant to me that wouldn't either chase her away or get me hexed into the next county. Did I _**mean**_ it when I kissed her back? Is the pope Catholic? Is rain wet?

I moved – just a little, and very carefully so as not to wake her – to position my face closer to the top of her head so I could breathe in her scent. That candyfloss hair smells just as good as it looks. I started up the play-by-play again.

_. . . . . . . "Jinx, I meant that as much as I've ever meant anything in my life. More."_

_That steady gaze searched my face, my mind, my very essence for anything untrue, any hint of a joke to be made. I knew she guarded her heart like the sentinels at Fort Knox. I knew she'd been hurt before. She'd dropped little hints from time to time, but I figured it would be a long time yet before she opened up to me to that level. "If you really meant it," she answered, "… well … I did, too."_

_My heart felt like it was trying to pull me up off the floor. It swelled in my chest until there was hardly any room for air, and I held onto her tightly, not wanting this dream to end. My grip made her gasp, and then giggle._

_Yeah, Jinx giggled. Jinx. The Mistress of Maniacal Laughter. She giggled like a seven-year-old. And the sound of it completed my life._

"_Can we get off the floor now, Wally? It's kinda cold."_

_I hadn't even so much as noticed the chill in the room. A bit preoccupied, you could say. But my grin never flagged as we stood. "Yeah. Guess I should have brought a bear-skin rug."_

"_Not on my account. The bear never did me wrong, and I don't much care for fur anyway." She caught my hand and pulled me toward the bed. "Certainly not when there's a nice warm bed, all made up and waiting."_

_That's when I noticed that all she was wearing was a loose tee-shirt and some boy-briefs. I froze. Wait … Bed? Her bed? Was she … was she implying what I thought she …_

_She must have caught the look on my face because she laughed out loud and hugged me close. "Silly boy. Do I scare you?"_

"_You … have no idea."_

"_Good. Shows you know me." She giggled again. "In one sense, anyhow."_

"_Jinx!"_

"_Oh, don't worry, you old prude, you. I just want to keep you close." And she hugged me again. "I need to snuggle you. I need to know you're here and you're okay and safe."_

_My arms went around her. "That works for me." . . . . . . ._

My stroking fingers must have finally registered on her sleepy self, because she stirred, shifted a little until she was half-way lying on me, and opened her eyes, turning her face my way. "Hi."

"Hi, yourself."

She pulled herself upward until her head was firmly ensconced in the crook of my neck. "That was the best night's sleep I've had in … um … hum … well, forever, I guess."

I found that a bit shocking. "Really?"

"Yep." She snuggled, if possible, even closer, and brought one leg up and over my stomach, tucking her heel under my thigh. She felt like a twining vine, and I was loving every bit of it.

"Wally?"

"Hm?"

"I like this."

"Me, too."

"I really like this."

"Uh-huh."

"Really, really."

"Um … what is …"

"From now on, if we sleep at the same time, we sleep together."

I hope she wasn't thinking she'd get an argument from me! There was no way I could keep the glee from my voice as I said, "If I have a vote here, I vote 'yea'."

"Well, you don't, but that's okay." And she kissed me again.

The kiss stretched out … and out … and things were starting to get to the point where I just might seriously embarrass myself, when there came a knock on the door.

We broke apart suddenly, looking at each other initially with a touch of panic, but then both of us firming up our resolve to not give a shit what anyone else thought. It's amazing what one quick look can tell you about what someone thinks. I didn't get up, but only called, "Come in!"

The door rattled. Violet's voice sifted through, "It's locked and I don't have the key handy."

Crap.

I got up and zipped over to the door, throwing it open. "Good morning, Violet. What can we do for you?"

If our being together surprised her, she hid it well. Holding out the T-Com Raven had left, she said, "This thing has been buzzing for a good three minutes. I assume your teammates want to talk to you."

##

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**A/N: Kid Flash can hold his own in almost every situation, but he is powerless in Jinx's clutches! Muwahahahaha-hack! *hack* *cough* *wheeze***

**Dang. Need to work on my Evil Overlord Cackle.**

**Anyway, remember: thoughtful readers leave reviews!**

**Concolor**


	9. Gathered

**Bespoke**

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_Disclaimer: _

_Teen Titans = The Incredibles = Not Mine. I just transcribe what the characters tell me._

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**Chapter Nine**

_* * Saturday 22 August, 08:45am CST * *_

Casting furtive glances around at the assembled Titans, Jinx held on tightly to Wally's hand. He gave her a reassuring squeeze, and that utterly open smile she had come to love so much. (And she was about 98% sure that "love" had a capital L.)

The Titans, having contacted Wally and learned that Jinx was with him, decided that they needed to repair to 'Edna's place', and it transpired that Edna had no problem with that. Everyone was currently in a spacious meeting hall for which the eccentric designer didn't have any other use.

"So …" Robin began, and trailed off for a second before continuing, "… so you're telling me it was an accident?"

In unison, they replied, "Pretty much." Then they looked at each other and grinned.

Starfire leaned over and whispered to Robin, "Are they not truly the cuteness of awesome?" She had picked up on their newly-fortified relationship within seconds, and could now barely restrain herself from continually emitting her version of 'SQUEEE!'. Just the _leakage_ from the emotional alien's mind was giving Raven a headache.

Cyborg, having successfully fought down a tiny and very much irrational bout of jealousy, had given Kid Flash a bro-punch and told him, under his breath, to be very careful with Jinx's heart.

As if that weren't already uppermost in his mind.

Robin examined their pink-haired ex-nemesis. "But you're wearing the suit now. Isn't that dangerous?"

"No, not if I'm not under pressure, or trying to use a lot of hex energy." She gave a frustrated shrug. "It's … hard to explain. It's almost like the suit wants to help, but doesn't really understand what I consider to be 'help'."

"What do you mean 'understand'? It's a suit."

"It's … a really sophisticated suit."

"Can you give me an example?"

"Well …"

Edna spoke up, "Show zem ze flight mode."

Sitting up a bit straighter, Robin thought, _**Flight**__ mode? What the hell?_

"Oh! Okay." She stood and backed away from the big table, closed her eyes and concentrated. Her lower body began to glow a slight pink as the hex energy manifested … and then she rose about a meter in the air.

"Careful of your head, dahling."

She stopped just before hitting the ceiling and said, "Oops. Right."

"Daaaaaamn!" said Cyborg, as he began a slow applause.

This time Starfire could _**NOT**_ restrain a loud SQUEEEE! before shouting, "Raven! Look! Jinx can come flying with us now! This will be the most amazingly incredible fun, yes? Does it not make your heart joyous?"

"Ecstatic." Her monotone was in full flower.

Beast Boy said, "Dude! How are you doin' that?"

Stopping in the air next to Kid Flash, the pink-haired girl considered his question. Jinx had found that most of the new things she could do with her suit, once she got into them, were fairly easy to maintain. She took a slow loop around the big room, then a faster one, then stopped again. "It's a willpower thing, best I can tell. Edna taught me how to do it with biofeedback techniques, so now I know how … that is, I sort of tell the suit what I want to happen, and the suit … lets it happen. It's kinda tough to explain."

Robin turned to the tiny designer and contemplated her for a bit. She returned his appraisal with change. Finally Robin said, "So how do you figure into this equation? I can't see your angle."

"I am here to aid Jinx in ze use of her suit, and zereby keep Kid Flash alive."

Wally startled badly at that pronouncement. Jinx's mouth fell open … and she fell to the floor, catching herself in a neat three-point landing at the last instant.

"Alive?" Robin's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean by that? Is he in danger of dying from something specific?"

"It is just so. My job, as I now see it, is to prevent zat as an outcome."

The Teen Wonder leaned forward. "How?"

"Zat … I am not sure of."

"Well why don't we start with what you _**are**_ sure of, hm?"

"Very well." She shot Violet a look. "I believe it may be time for complete transparency."

Robin gave a snort. "That would be refreshing."

"Your pardon I beg. Zere were too many variables. Between Dr. Wattersen, ze uncertainty of how Jinx would interact wiss her suit, ze involvement of ze gangs, ze time differential between dimensions, ze lack of …"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Wally held up both hands. "Too many variables is right. First off, how do you know Dr. Wattersen?"

That brought a long sigh in response. "I do not know him in ze sense you mean. But he was very close friends wiss Martin Brewer."

"Yeah, he said they were, like, best friends."

"Martin … was my grandson."

Things got really quiet around the table. Jinx said, "Wait … wait a minute."

"Yeah," Wally picked up the thread, "the Doc said he was … hang on, he musta been in his forties!"

"He was forty-five when he died."

"You, beggin' your pardon, look like you _might_ be old enough to be his mom, if you started young. But there is _**no way**_ …"

"Zat is what I meant about ze time differential." She tossed another glance at Violet, who shrugged and nodded. "Time does not move in ze same way between our two dimensions."

"… Oh."

"We have been here zis time for approximately two weeks."

"Seventeen days," amended Violet.

"Yes. And when we …"

"And two hours." Violet glanced at her watch. "And eleven minutes."

The designer gave her a frustrated glare and continued, "When we return to our home, exactly eighteen minutes and forty-seven seconds will have elapsed."

That thick silence settled around the table again. Raven, who had more experience with dimension-hopping than any of the others, asked, "May I assume that number is a constant, regardless of how much time you spend here?"

"Zat is correct. And ze interesting part is zat while we are here, it appears zat we do not age."

The Titans all exchanged significant looks. "And," responded Raven, "it would seem you've spent a lot of time in our dimension."

"Indeed, I have."

"Enough to gain something of a reputation as a designer."

"Enough," interjected Robin, "to develop a nice working relationship with the DoD and DARPA."

"Again, yes."

Starfire spoke quietly, much more quietly than usual. "Enough to meet someone and fall in love."

The rest of them looked at her in surprise. Edna swallowed and looked away briefly. "Yes. Enough for zat as well."

"And Martin Brewer was your grandson," stated the alien. "He was born here."

"Yes."

Her face the image of concern, Starfire asked, "What of your daughter?"

Edna gave her a keen eye. "How did you know I had a daughter?"

"It is merely a reasoned deduction, but … _your_ name is not Brewer," explained the alien, "It is Mode. The custom on most of this world – certainly in _this_ part of it – is for a woman to take her husband's surname. And if you had had a son, 'Mode' would have been his surname, and that would have been your grandson's surname. Since it wasn't, the most likely chain of events points to your having a daughter."

An appreciative nod gave Starfire her answer. "You are most keen. Zis is fascinating. Ze media does not consider you to be among ze brighter Titans, but I sink zey have it wrong." She sighed. "My daughter … died in childbirth." She grew quiet, staring off into the past. The Titans gave her what space she required, and at length she continued, "She was never … very strong. Physically. I was … quite distraught afterwards. I took Martin back wiss me to my own dimension, but it soon became apparent zat his body was not compatible. Ze time differential worked against him. He was born here. He needed to stay here. I found a good family for him."

"But you kept in touch, didn't you?" asked Robin. "That genius he exhibited …"

"Yes. Again, you are correct. I aided him in … many ways. I could see zat he had ze spark. I merely nurtured it."

Cyborg nodded knowingly. "And he ended up in the family business."

"I suppose you could look at it zat way."

Starfire floated over and landed next to the tiny woman, kneeling beside her chair. Her glowing green eyes the very image of earnest, she asked, "And what of your love?"

"Ah, love. Love is a very unpredictable sing, is it not?"

The alien laid a tender hand on Edna's arm. "I am very sorry."

Edna patted that hand. "Sank you. But I am not sorry for having loved, even if … well … even given how everysing has worked out."

Starfire swept her up into an enthusiastic hug. "Oh, I wish _more_ humans would feel that way!"

"Star," interjected Robin, "maybe not so tight?"

"Oh, my apologies!"

The designer seemed none the worse for wear after catching her breath again. "It is fine, dahling."

"I still don't get it, dude!" Beast Boy popped up on the other side from Starfire. "How's all that … what's it got t'do with keepin' Kid Flash alive?"

"Ah. Yes." Edna was all business again. "One of ze effects of dimensional travel is zat one occasionally gets … insights into ze probability matrix of one's destination."

Beast Boy looked over at Cyborg. "That make any sense to you?"

"Oh, yeah." He drilled Edna with a keen, robotic eye. "You picked up a little precognition along the way, dincha?"

She nodded. "It is imperfect, as is all such prognostication, but ze summary is zat Kid Flash's life will be in danger very soon, and …"

"But it already was!" protested Jinx.

"Yes, it was, and we were able to prevent his demise. But zat is not ze instance I saw. Zat series of events has yet to pass." She pointed at Jinx. "It will be up to you to save him in zat scenario."

"Me? But …" She looked at Wally, a hundred thousand thoughts and images racing each other through her mind. Then she nodded and said, "Right. He's my job now. Got it."

Wally felt like he was drowning. "Don't I get any input here?"

The others ignored him. "And the suit?" prompted Robin.

"Ze suit is somesing of a wildcard. In ze vision I received, she is very hazy. I cannot tell if she is wearing it or not. I cannot even recognize her face, zough I know it is her."

He nodded in comprehension, then looked over at Jinx. "Don't think for a second that we're not going to help. Wally's our friend, and a Titan. We take care of our own."

"All help is cheerfully accepted," asserted the bad-luck charm. "Encouraged, even."

Cyborg turned back to Edna and said, "Tell me somethin', though."

"If I can."

"You're tryin' t'keep Wally here in one piece, right?"

"Yes."

"But he's a hero. Putting his life on the line is in the job description." He waved a hand around, taking in the rest of the Titans. "Same goes for all of us. You plannin' on followin' him around the rest of your life?"

"No, no, you misunderstand. I know zat being an active super is quite dangerous. But I was given a vision of a specific scene. Kid Flash would be, in zat instance, unable to help himself, and would die wissout aid." She pointed at Jinx. "Her aid. However, wiss ze advent of ze suit, it became imperative zat she learn its proper functions so zat when ze time came, she would be ready."

"And you're some kinda expert on super-suits?"

"Is she ever!" exclaimed Violet. "She's been making super-suits for the supers back home for years and years!"

"… Okay. … So … just Wally, huh? You didn't get any kind of inside info on anybody else?"

"Ah … not as such."

"So you're just tryin' t' help where you can? That it?"

She looked at Violet again and sighed. "I did say complete transparency." Squaring her shoulders, she faced Cyborg and said, "I received several different – but related – visions. Some of zem had to do wiss an incident several years in ze future."

"… Yeah?"

"I have great-grandchildren. Martin and his wife had sree children. In a few years, two of zem will be driving in Keystone and would be killed, collateral damage in a firefight, if not for Kid Flash's intervention."

The Titans blinked at her for a few seconds. Beast Boy sputtered, "So … so all this is just … you wanna save Wally's life … just so he can save those _kids?_ How screwed up is that?"

Her lips pursed severely, Edna retorted, "In ze first place, if it saves your friend's life, why do you care about ze motive? And in ze second …" She leaned forward and laced her fingers together. "… what effort would _**you**_ consider to be too much to save a member of your family, hmm?"

That gave the Titans quite a lot to chew on as each thought of the various extreme lengths they had gone to for one another over the years. Robin finally nodded and said, "Point taken."

"I got another question," said Cyborg, looking at Edna.

"Yes?"

"How'd you get here the first time? What's special about the connection between your dimension and ours?"

"I was wondering the same thing," said Raven. "I don't believe it is a _close_ dimension, or I would have come across it before."

Violet and Edna glanced at each other, the same thoughts running through their heads: _She travels dimensions almost as a matter of course? Damn!_

Edna answered, "It happened zat a team of supers in our home dimension had fought and overcome an evil genius …"

"No shortage of _those_ anywhere, it sounds like," said Beast Boy.

"Ah … yes. You are correct. In any case, ze evil genius had been interested in dimensional travel. He believed – erroneously, I sink – zat he could pull power from one dimension and use it in anozzer. To zat end, he had built a machine zat allowed him to lock onto a specific dimension. Zis is ze one he chose, for reasons which I do not understand."

"His theory might hold more truth than you know, Ms. Mode," stated Raven.

She raised an eyebrow. "Is zis so?"

"Yes. Although usually such power is greater than a mortal can wield. Typically it is demons who try to do the sort of thing you describe. Except they use magic instead of technology."

"… Demons?" Edna's inflection telegraphed plainly that she was unconvinced.

Raven nodded. "Usually."

Violet chimed in, "Demons? Really?" Her tone was the essence of skepticism. "You actually _believe_ in demons?"

The Titans, with the exception of Raven, gave her a big 'guffaw' in response to that question. Raven stared at her for a moment and then darkness began swirling around her, spreading out into the room, surrounding them all. Raven rose from her seat and floated into the middle of the table, suddenly seeming much larger than she had been. In a voice that evoked and fed a deep and gibbering terror in the two other-dimensional women, she said, "Belief has nothing to do with it. Demonstrable certainty has no need of 'belief'. Do you 'believe' in gravity? Do you 'believe' in water?"

Violet and Edna could only stare, open-mouthed, as another set of eyes opened on Raven's forehead, all of them now glowing red.

"I am Raven, bastard daughter of Trigon the Terrible, Demon Lord of the Eighth Ring of Tartarus. By his machinations I was conceived, destined to be nothing more than a portal for him to invade and dominate this realm. I resisted his will, and died as a result when he came through. He laid waste to this planet, turning everyone to stone. But my friends, the Teen Titans, I gifted with a portion of my power beforehand. This saved them, and through their stalwart efforts Trigon was destroyed and I was restored to life." She floated over closer to them; her multiple eyes filled their vision, filled their minds. "You ask me if I believe in demons. I ask you: do you believe in humans?"

Then they were all just sitting there and everything was exactly as it had been, except that Violet and Edna were clutching each other the way a drowning man hugs a life saver, and staring in abject fear at the dark girl. Raven leaned forward, placed her elbows on the table and rested her chin on her fists. "Yes." Her voice was very quiet, almost bored. "You could say we believe in demons."

Robin sighed and gave her a pointed look. "Was it really necessary to scare them out of three years of life?"

"If a picture is worth a thousand words, an experience should be worth at least ten thousand, don't you think?"

Robin shook his head and turned back to Edna and Violet. "Sorry about that. She has quite a flair for the dramatic, and you sort of stepped on a sore toe with that remark."

Raven gave the pair another almost-bored look and said, "Ground and center, ladies; I didn't even touch you, and I can feel quite clearly that you are unharmed. We have a lot to cover this morning, and we're running out of time."

Violet blinked, drew a few long breaths which she blew out her nose, and said, "I know about _our_ time pressure issue. What's yours?"

"That gang will be attacking Keystone City again, most probably today."

"Shit!"

"Yeah," agreed Beast Boy, "what you said. Bad dudes on the way. We gotta stop 'em."

Wally held up a hand. "When they attacked my apartment, they had a bi-directional sonic barrier."

Robin gaped at him. "You mean … they knew you were there? They were after you, specifically?"

He nodded. "The civilian deaths were just incidental. I don't know for sure if they knew which apartment I was in, but they for sure knew I was in there somewhere."

Jinx gave him a look. "I thought you couldn't remember …"

He waved off her objection. "It's been comin' back. I think I remember pretty much everything now, at least up to when that rocket hit."

She grinned a little. "Cool. I'm glad."

"But that means they must have had you under surveillance for a while!"

Wally considered that. "Huh. Guess so. Otherwise, how would they know?"

"So it looks like they've been planning operations in Keystone for some time." Robin smacked one hand with a fist. "They knew you were the city's guardian hero, and they came prepared. That does not leave me feeling warm and fuzzy."

"Got that right."

"But," observed Jinx with a frown, "they didn't do anything about me. So either they didn't know about me, or they didn't consider me a threat."

A wry chuckle escaped from Beast Boy. "They won't make that mistake again! Not after that hex blast being splashed all over national TV."

"He's right!" agreed Robin. "They'll be on the lookout for you now, Jinx!"

She smirked, "How are they gonna combat bad luck?"

"I don't know."

"I think I do," said Starfire. "I was watching one of the recent shows of talk where the host was debating the wisdom of your actions with the president of Concerned Citizens of Keystone."

Wally chuckled. "That bunch! What a crop of nutballs! You know their organization is widely referred to as 'CoCK', right? 'cause it's what they use for brains!"

She shook her head hesitantly. "I was not aware of this acronym, but that has not anything to do with what I saw."

"Oh. Okay. Go ahead."

"The host of show was making the statements that Jinx is a bona fide hero and that she regularly places herself in the way of harm for the good of the city. To prove this, he showed a piece of film from a few days ago where Jinx and Kid Flash were stopping a gang conflict. Jinx was shot from behind. He had a very good still frame from the video that showed her blood spraying from her chest." She looked around at the others. "I believe they will try to do the sniping of Jinx."

Robin and Cyborg gave each other a significant look. "Yeah, I can see that," said Robin.

"Right," his teammate agreed. "That'd be right up their alley, too. They've got a hell of a lot of assassins."

Starfire looked at Jinx sadly. "I feel that this will be their plan, and I worry for you."

The cat-eyed girl looked at Wally and giggled. "A sniper, huh? Let's hope so."

That drew large question-marks from the Titans, who all looked at her as if she'd cracked. Cyborg said, "Pinky, you really need to take this seriously. If they got a bead on you …"

She laughed a bit louder. "Wally, can you get your hands on a …"

There was a significant wash of air, followed by another about two seconds later, and Wally was holding a large rifle. "Borrowed it from the National Guard Armory. Chambered for .338 Lapua."

Robin gazed at the rifle dubiously. "That's a military sniper round."

"Exactly! I bet they won't have anything this powerful. They tend to favor the AK-47."

Jinx eyed the weapon delightedly. "Cool! That might just hit as hard as you do."

"Put your helmet on."

"Oh, right!" And she did so while he zipped to the other end of the room. She looked at the Titans and said, "Might wanna cover your ears."

"Waitaminnit!" yelled Cyborg. "What the hell are you …"

"Don't worry about it." She turned and faced Wally. "Fire at will!"

And he did.

Raven was the only Titan who had covered her ears, and that didn't help all that much. The report left their heads ringing, and they all yelled and started toward Jinx.

She removed her helmet and grinned at them, then stooped and picked up the spent round. Tossing it to Robin, she said, "I sincerely _**hope**_ they try sniping me."

"… How the hell …"

There was another strong breeze in the room and then Kid Flash was back. "The suit's designed to absorb and re-direct kinetic energy."

"Yeah," said Jinx, "it's totally cool. I feel a squeeze all over. Depending on how much force is hitting me, it might be a strong squeeze, but the point is that I don't get holes poked in me."

Beast Boy popped up beside her. "That's too much!" He poked at the suit. "Can I hit it?"

Wally said, "I've already used the dingbat on it, while I was moving at Mach 8. I promise you that you won't be able to damage her."

Something began beeping. Edna pulled a small device from a pocket and turned to Violet. "It has begun."

Robin got a chill. "What? What's that?"

Violet was already turning on the big monitor at the end of the room. "Edna has equipment that tracks the local news stations." The picture came on, showing a distant view of City Hall with an on-the-scene reporter hunkered down behind a bullet-ridden van.

"… haven't stated any demands yet, but they do have the Mayor, the Ombudsman, and the Chief of Police as hostages. To repeat, the international gang known as MS13 has taken over City Hall …"

"Titans, go!"

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**A/N: And now things will begin to heat up a bit. Read and Review!**

**Concolor**


	10. Contacted

**Bespoke**

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_Disclaimer: _

_Disney/Pixar and DC and Warner still own all this stuff … well, the characters anyhow. Except the incidental types, like Dr. Wattersen, and anyone else the above-mentioned mega-corporations never heard of. I also own the plot, insofar as there is one._

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**Chapter Ten**

_* * Saturday 22 August, 09:08am CST * *_

Having decided that speed trumped comfort, the Titans allowed Violet and Edna to teleport them over to City Hall (yes, even Kid Flash, who figured the occupying force would probably have the same sort of sonic-interference shield that stopped him before). They popped in two blocks south of the building complex, just outside the police cordon. Three bombed-out and burning cars marked what looked like the boundary of the gang's control, at least from this direction. Several more littered the street between their location and the front door of City Hall, which had lost the great majority of its glass.

Once they got their bearings (and he made sure no one was going to lose his or her breakfast) Robin peered around, spotted a concentration of SWAT personnel, poked Kid Flash's arm, and trotted over. They stopped just outside the knot of black uniforms, listening as Captain Stone went over a contingency plan. About six seconds later, one of the SWAT team guys noticed the brightly-colored heroes and gave the Captain a nudge. He glanced up, did a double-take while his jaw dropped, and then strode over to them.

"… Kid Flash?"

"Yes, sir?"

"When did … but you … you were … well, I'll be damned. You look … better … _**way**_ better. When did you get out of the hospital?"

"I was never in the hospital in the first place. That poor schlub in the ICU is the ambulance driver."

The comical expression on the Captain's face forced Robin to throttle a laugh before it embarrassed him. He thought this might not be the best time for levity. "Ah … Captain Stone? It's a long story, but basically it's a case of mistaken identity. Yeah, Kid Flash was injured – and very badly – but he was kept out of sight until he … uh … got better." He then noticed a news crew about half a block down the street. They were pointing animatedly at Kid Flash and two of them were filming the meeting.

Jerking a thumb their way, Wally added, "And it looks like everyone _**else**_ is gonna know about it reeeeeal soon."

The Captain scratched behind his right ear while contemplating the two teens. "Huh. Okay. Whatever. We'll get that straightened out later, assuming we have a 'later' to work with." Nodding at Wally, he said, "Guess we better get you up to speed on things, then."

"That'd be good, sir. But I'd like to include the others in the powwow if you don't mind."

He threw his hands up. "Sure. What the hell. More the merrier. It was the Mayor's idea to keep the Titans at arm's length in the first place, not mine, and he ain't in a position to argue the point just now."

Robin tapped a button on his T-Com. A couple of seconds later the other Titans all checked their Coms, located Robin, and trotted over (well, Beast Boy trotted, having become a large, extinct quadruped; Vic rode on his neck, and the three girls flew). Captain Stone motioned them all over to a table the SWAT team had set up in front of a Walgreens, out of line-of-sight with City Hall.

"What we got here," began the Captain without preamble, "is a shithole of epic proportions. Gang's holed up in the complex. They moved in sometime last night. Took out all the guards and …"

"They killed them?" queried Starfire.

"Hm?"

"The criminals of gang. Did they kill the guards, or simply incapacitate them?"

He seemed to be working out her phraseology for a few seconds before replying, "No, they killed 'em. S.O.P. for MS13. They don't have much patience for lookin' after prisoners, and they don't have any hesitation about murder. At all." He reached a hand over toward her. "We haven't been introduced. I'm Jack Stone. And you'd be Starfire, right?"

"Oh, yes!" She pumped his hand enthusiastically, making him wince.

Raven laid a cool finger against the alien's shoulder. "Don't break him, Star."

"Oh." She quickly withdrew her hand. "My apologies."

He flexed his fingers a few times and worked the hand back and forth. "No prob." Glancing at the shorter girl, he said, "Raven, right?"

She nodded once, maintaining silence.

"And you're Cyborg," he said, pointing at Victor, then he turned to Beast Boy, who had resumed his human form. "And you're the shape-shifter."

"Beast Boy, in the flesh! And that's any kind o' flesh ya need." He became a gorilla, then a hummingbird, then a large scorpion before returning to his resting form.

"Ah … right." He shook his head and drew a deep breath. "And of course _**you**_ are Robin," he added, facing the Titans' leader. "Kind of unmistakable. All of you."

"We do our best." This was said without a trace of sarcasm that Captain Stone could detect. Raven, of course, knew better.

The Captain then waved at Jinx. "Hey, Jinx. Good to see you here, too."

"Thanks, Cap."

He gave Robin a sidelong glance. "You know this little lady has been nine flavors of useful around here, right?"

"So I've heard."

"Yeah. By my best count she's saved four of my men from gettin' shot. Real popular with the beat cops she is."

Robin, unfazed, asked, "So, do you have a sit-op for the complex?"

Captain Stone studied him for a few seconds before executing a one-shouldered shrug. "Unfortunately, no. We've tried getting closer twice now, and it's cost me a man both times."

"Damn."

"Uh-huh. And besides Mayor Mason, they've got Chief Henry and the Ombudsman … what's his name?"

"Pitrovo Usolodakolovski," supplied one of the SWAT team.

"Yeah, him. I always leave out a syllable or two. Most everybody calls him Solo. He's a big Star Wars fan." Turning his attention to the table, Captain Stone pointed to the plan diagram of the complex. "Yeah, and they've got another twenty city employees besides those three. They're keepin' all the hostages deep inside somewhere. Our best guess is one of these four locations." He pointed them out, and then looked up at the Titans. "You guys got anything fancy that could get us inside?"

#

On the other side of the street, Edna and Violet watched as the heroes talked with the Captain. The designer muttered, "All we did for zem, and zey completely ignore us now."

"They're probably just used to working only as their team. They don't know what I can do, so they don't know how to use me."

"Oh, zey know. I believe zey are afraid of being upstaged."

"Oh, Edna! Surely not. They wouldn't be that petty, would they? They're superheroes!"

"Supers zey may be, but zat does not mean zey lack a desire for ze spotlight." She gave Violet a short push. "You should be wiss zem."

"I'm not on their team!"

"Zen help zem as you may. But go on over. Turn invisible if you feel you must, but go be a part of ze action. You are ze most durable super present, and zey should be made aware of zis fact."

"Okay, okay, no need to get huffy." She faded out and walked quietly over to the group, listening as they tried to formulate a plan.

#

Raven picked up on the disturbance in the local aura stream. She closed her eyes, mouthing her mantra silently, and shortly identified the newcomer. Casually, she moved around so that the bulk of the group was between them, melted into the ground, and re-emerged behind Violet. When she was sure again that she had the other girl's location pegged, she stepped up to within half a meter of her and said, "Piece of advice …"

Violet, taken completely unaware, jumped violently while giving a loud gasp and lost her concentration, becoming visible again. This startled those nearest her, who began to give her some stern looks. Two of them drew their side arms. Her head jittered back and forth between the SWAT team and Raven. The dark Titan closed the distance between them and continued, "If you want to be a part of the action, all you have to do is ask. This sneaking around may be a habit with you. I don't know. But it won't get you brownie points with us."

Casting an exasperated look back at Edna (who was engrossed in her data pad and had missed the entire exchange) Violet slumped and said, "I told her you were used to working as a team. I told her I wouldn't fit in with the group because I haven't trained with you and …"

"Did you hear what I said?"

The older girl stopped and thought that over, then brightened. "So … you don't mind?"

"Are you serious? We watched on surveillance cameras as you, ah, _disposed_ of five heavily armed gangsters by yourself. Unless that was a one-time fluke, we could use your help." Raven crossed her arms. "By the way, we meant to ask. How did you do that?"

"Force fields."

The empath nodded. "That was my most likely answer. So you simply compressed those men out of existence?"

"Oh, they aren't gone. Just really, really tiny."

Raven _almost_ gave the ghost of a snort in response. "Tiny. Microscopic?"

"No, just, oh, half a millimeter in diameter."

"That would make them really dense."

"Yeah, they drop into the earth and can penetrate quite a way, sometimes even through pavement."

"Remind me," quoth Raven, "not to piss you off."

That pulled the first smile onto Violet's face that any of them had seen. "I don't think you have to worry about me! You can teleport."

"Under favorable circumstances, yes."

Captain Stone said, "I take it she's not a member of the Titans?"

Violet shook her head. "No, sir. I'm … um, not from around here."

"Ah-huh. Well, if you want to help, I'm not in the mood to refuse." Getting Robin's attention, he asked, "Can you add her into the plan?"

"I don't see why not." Addressing Violet, he asked, "Your invisibility … is it full-spectrum?"

"It is now, yeah. Didn't used to be. It was just effective in the actinic and higher spectra until a couple years ago. But I figured out how to keep from showing up on infrared." Walling her eyes over at Raven, she added, "Not that it made any difference to her."

"I didn't need sight to find you."

For some reason that sent a shiver down Violet's back.

Pushing the conversation back onto topic, Robin asked, "That force field, tell me about it."

"Oh. Okay." That seemed to perk Violet up. She created a faintly sparkling ball of lavender in each hand. "I can make more than one at a time, up to about six if I have the luxury of concentration." One ball disappeared and the other grew to about three meters across. Violet stepped into it and made a small window in the near side. "I can use 'em for protection, for me or a group, up close or at a distance." It winked out. Another one, very small, appeared over the table, bobbed down and scooped up a pencil, rose into the air, and quickly shrank to nothing, taking the pencil with it. "And I can squish things. I first developed this because none of my college housemates would ever take out the garbage. But it comes in handy."

To a man, the SWAT team had drawn a breath and taken a step back. A crooked grin grew on Captain Stone's face. "Hell's bells! What do they call you?"

"Um … Ultraviolet. Usually. Because of the color of my force field. But that's just the news people. I don't really have an official … uh, 'hero' name. Just a code designation from the NSA."

He frowned at her then. "You work for the NSA?"

"Uh … y-yes? Is that bad?"

"It's weird. Why would the National Security Administration be …"

She held up both hands. "Whoa! Whoa, there. Different acronym. Sorry. That's the National Supers Agency. I never heard of that 'Security' thing."

"… What the hell is the National Supers Agency?"

"Uh …"

Kid Flash stepped forward. "Cap? When she said she wasn't from around here, she really, really meant it."

"… You mean she's an alien?" He peered at her closely. "She looks human to me."

"I'm, uh, from …" She huffed in frustration and looked around at the Titans. Starfire smiled and nodded in encouragement, and Beast Boy gave her the thumbs-up. "… from a parallel dimension. At least, I assume it's parallel. All the state names are the same, as far as I know."

The Captain just stared at her.

She began to fidget. "Look, I'm sorry about …"

"Son of a bitch."

"… Excuse me?"

"Off-worlders. Cyborgs. Metahumans. Shape-shifters. And now they're busin' 'em in from alternate realities." His heavy, iron-gray head shook a few times in wonder. Again, he expressed a disgusted, "Whatever," and sighed. "So, okay, you wanna help save the Mayor and kick some gangster ass?"

"Oh! Yes, sir!"

"Good enough for me." Turning back to Robin, he prompted, "You were saying?"

"Right. We can use her for reconnaissance …"

"Captain!" Two officers ran up. "Captain Stone! They've sent a man out! He wants to talk!"

##

_* * 09:55am CST * *_

The Titans had seen their share of gang members. It was a growing problem in Jump, and getting fairly serious in spots. But all their gangs were local; home-grown talent you might say. And while they could be violent, and had no respect for authority, and frequently got involved in criminal activities, there weren't all that many of them and they weren't anyone's idea of organized.

This fellow though? They could toss all their preconceptions out the window.

The first thing they noticed was the 'Force Recon' tattoo on the side of his face, followed immediately by the self-assured and confident way he carried himself. He feared nothing, and was not afraid to broadcast that fact, aided more than somewhat by the masses of radically ripped muscle displayed by his desert-camo tank top. Deep-set, snapping black eyes regarded them from under heavy brows, missing nothing. He stood there in the middle of the street at parade rest, waiting on them with all the aplomb of a seasoned diplomat, a staff adorned with a white flag resting easily in one hand.

Captain Stone approached him cautiously, eyeing the city government complex in the near distance. He had already gotten some sad experience with the accuracy of their snipers, and wasn't too keen on standing in the open this way. But there was a slight chance they would honor the truce, and he felt compelled to take it. Not for the first time did he feel a deep twinge of regret that most of the Justice League was currently off-world.

Raven flanked the Captain on one side, Robin on the other. They felt that, between them, if the gangsters tried something they could probably stop it. They hoped so.

When three meters separated them, Captain Stone stopped. "I'm told you have a message."

"Got two. Here's the first." He held out a cigar box.

The Captain didn't take it. "What's that?"

"Proof."

"Proof? Of what?"

"That we mean business and that we can and will do what it takes to get payback." He shook the box gently.

Taking two steps forward, Captain Stone accepted the box. He opened it … and turned rather pale. Looking up at the gangster with murder clear in his eyes, he ground out, "Is this …"

"The Mayor's left forefinger. Yes. You can check the print if you like."

Captain Stone choked impotently.

"And we'll be more than happy to send the Mayor back to you in as many pieces as it takes to get what we want."

"You sick bastards!"

"Now, the second part of the message." He pulled an envelope from a back pocket and held it out. "This … is for _**Jinx**_." The venom that he put into that name startled the Captain out of his fury. He frowned at the rectangle of white paper, glanced up at the smirk on the other man's face, frowned harder, and made to grab the message.

"Captain, stop!" came Raven's clear voice. "The letter … there is something wrong with it! Don't touch it!"

"Fuckin'witch!" yelled the gangster. "Die!" In one smooth motion he drew a knife from the small of his back and threw it.

Raven was concentrating on the contents of the letter; she could feel a rank pustule of ill will festering in the thing, and could tell instinctively that it wouldn't do the Captain any good _at all_. The level of virulence present in what she knew to be an inanimate object chilled her as nothing had since the unfortunate episode with Malchior. So preoccupied was she with the evil enchantment that she didn't realize death was flying toward her neck. Robin saw it and shifted to intercept, even as he knew he would be too late …

The knife stopped about fifteen centimeters from the empath's unprotected throat, surrounded by a sparkling ball which shrank to nothing and vanished. Raven then snapped her glare over to the gangster, who stood there with his mouth open and his eyes getting very wide. He took a step back, but was instantly enveloped in inky shadow. He and Raven sank into the street. The letter he had held fluttered to earth.

The Captain jumped back at the same time. "Whatthe_**hell**_whatthe_**hell**_whatthe_**hell!**_"

Robin zipped around to place himself between the lawman and City Hall, whipping up his cape and hoping that the bullet-resistant nature of the complex fabric would be up to the task. He saw the muzzle flash …

… and the slug ricocheted off a larger version of the flickering field that stopped the knife. Violet's voice, much closer than he would have imagined, shouted, "Can we just _**go**_ now?"

They all beat a retreat to their previous position.

A few seconds later a black circle formed under the letter lying in the street, and it, too, vanished.

#

Sergeant Manuel Esteves hadn't been afraid of anything in a long time. In revenge for the murder of his father, at the age of fourteen he had tracked down and slit the throats of the two Crips who had robbed their small Southside store; they had shot the old man for kicks. That drew the attention of the rest of the gang, and in self-defense Manny joined up with MS13. He had occasion to kill several more Crips in the next few months, a time that the Chicago papers referred to as the Season of Blood.

Over the next four years he gained quite a reputation as an enforcer and sometime assassin for the gang, and came to the attention of the leadership. After several meetings and tests, it was decided that he should join the military to pick up the latest tactics. He chose the Marines, worked very hard to qualify for a slot in Special Forces, and joined the ranks of Force Reconnaissance in less than two years. Five years and numerous successful missions later, he felt he had gleaned all he needed, went AWOL, and dropped out of sight.

Now in his late twenties, he had been instrumental in updating MS13 in both tactics and firepower. He had personally trained no fewer than eleven assassins. Four of his students were in the group of snipers that currently held Keystone City Hall. He could bench press almost two hundred kilos and dead lift twice that. His martial arts skills were the equal of all but a handful of experts, and ran the gamut of armed and unarmed styles. He had a high native intelligence, a natural facility for planning, and a complete lack of ruth. In short, he was perfect for his position, and made a very, very bad enemy.

None of that, however, had prepared him for what he saw when he opened his eyes.

At first, he couldn't recall what had occurred to put him in this place. One second he was standing in the street, waiting on the targets to come out to him, and the next …

No, wait. That … that girl. The dark one. He could feel that she was different somehow.

Yes! That asshat Captain had come to meet him, a freak at either side. He recognized Robin, and had begun planning their battle (he itched to try his skills against the famous partner of The Bat) but then …

Then things went south.

They wouldn't touch the letter. If the Captain had only touched it! They could have taken over his mind and …

That girl again. She stopped him. And then he knew she had to die first. Change of plans. And he was nothing if not flexible.

But … his knife just … stopped. Then it vanished. And then he knew that the enchantments their priest had used, ordered and enabled by Ashmadia the Wrathful, had gone for nothing.

Then he had awoken here.

It was dark, dismal, and utterly silent. What little light there was didn't seem to have a single source … it simply _was_. A hot wind tugged at his hair, pulling up sweat only to dry it instantly, leaving behind a sticky, scaly sheen that made his face itch. The blighted ground stretched off past sight, undulating in sickening folds, peppered with jagged rocks and the withered remains of trees, in which crouched … things. Black things, in shape like great birds, but with four red eyes. And they watched him. Silently.

Intently.

Hungrily.

Yes, Sergeant Manuel Esteves had been unacquainted with fear for many years. But he knew fear now.

He glanced around. There was nowhere to hide. It all looked the same.

One of the bird-things lifted its wings, adjusted its position on its branch … and suddenly it was closer.

The hairs raising along his arms and neck, Manny stumbled backward and tripped over a rock, landing painfully. He bounced back up, but now blood dripped slowly from his hand.

One of the things took flight, slowly flapping upward, then circling. It was joined by two, then by another two, their ascent accompanied by the most profoundly intense lack of sound he had ever imagined. Then, as one, the rest of them launched. They bunched up and began falling toward him, red eyes glaring, sharp beaks agape …

He screamed then, and ran. He neither knew nor cared what he might be running toward, only knowing that he had to get away from the nightmare flock. Approaching a particularly large tree, he saw that it had a deep cleft. From that strait he might be able to mount some sort of defense! Slipping quickly inside, he crouched, and turned …

The sky was clear. The flying abominations were gone. He hadn't heard them behind him; their wings made no noise. He had just assumed …

With a shaky laugh, he stood and took a step … or tried to. His foot wouldn't move. He looked down to see what he had caught it on, only to realize with sudden horror that the roots of the tree had wrapped his feet tightly. Even now, more tendrils oozed out of the cracked and decaying wood, trapping his arms, his legs …

The low, moaning _creeeeeeak_ was the first thing that had registered on his ears since he arrived in this terrible place. The tree was … moving. He was lifted, still held immobile, then turned back toward the tree, which, as he could now see, was grinning at him, its four red eyes glowing, glowing and malevolent. The crack in its side, the cleft where he had run for safety, was now its maw, filled to overflowing with long, translucent, needle-like teeth. A waft of nauseating breath came from it, the hideous mouth opening wider, and he was tilted, angled toward that portal to hell …

"That will do."

The voice came from behind him. He wanted to speak, but the rootlets covered his face, clamping his mouth shut.

**I WANT HIM!**

"I know, but you'll just have to wait." The voice was now beside him.

**DO NOT DENY ME!**

"We'll see." The dark girl! It was her! She floated around in front of him, between him and the demonic thing, and he prayed to anyone or anything that might be listening for her to stay there. The sweat ran down his body in rivulets. She spoke again, "He may know something of use to us. If he can convince me to do so, I will free him."

**NO! HE IS MINE!**

"That remains to be seen." She floated closer. "Tell me, Meat …"

_Yes!_ He wanted to scream, _Yes, I will tell you anything! Anything! Just let me go!_ But his mouth was fastened stubbornly shut. He could only plead with his eyes.

"Tell me about what is going on inside City Hall. Tell me this, and perhaps I can persuade Rage to let you go."

This fear that gripped him, this fear with which he was so unfamiliar, had a marvelously loosening effect on Manny's tongue. Even before the rootlets had fully retracted, he was jabbering full-tilt about the men and the weapons and the defensive perimeter and …

##

_* * 10:15am CST * *_

"How long is she gonna stay like that?"

Robin cast a quick glance toward Captain Stone and then returned his gaze to the floating empath. "It varies."

"According to what?"

"That varies, too."

Jack Stone was getting very tired of Robin's laconic and evasive answers to his simplest questions. If this was the way he interacted with Jump City PD, it was a wonder they ever cooperated on anything!

Then Raven opened her eyes.

"Captain?" Robin touched his shoulder.

"Ah-ha! You're back. Robin says you've been interrogating that gangster."

She nodded. "He is correct."

"Well?"

Soberly, she looked back and forth between them, unlaced her legs, and stood, wrapping her cloak around her. "This is going to be very, very tricky."

##

. . .

. . .

. . .

**A/N: Poor Manny. (Or maybe not, since he deserves whatever she dishes out.) I knew Raven was going to bring someone to Nevermore, but I never expected that! Read and Review, please.**

**Concolor**


	11. Armed

**Bespoke**

. . .

. . .

. . .

_Disclaimer:_

_Still don't own The Incredibles. That would be Disney/Pixar and Brad Bird and other assorted geniuses. Still don't own the Teen Titans. That would be DC and Warner and whoever else was involved in their invention and promulgation. Just doing this for fun. Go about your lives, citizens._

. . .

. . .

. . .

**Chapter Eleven**

_* * Saturday 22 August, 10:22amCST * *_

"You have _**got**_ to be joking!"

Raven gave the Titans' leader a baleful look that told him exactly what she thought of that comment. He cleared his throat and laughed nervously. "Sorry. Go on."

"Robin." The word was just loud enough to hear, and totally deadpan.

"Um … yeah?"

"Hosting that gangster in my mind has given me a headache that would reduce _**your**_ skull to so much shrapnel. Under the BEST of circumstances, I don't 'joke'. You know this; it is not occult information. Do NOT push it."

The other team members wisely decided to stay out of this exchange. Very shortly after coming out of her trance, Raven had teleported all the Titans back to Robin's room for this debriefing, her grim visage killing most conversation.

"Okay," admitted Robin, suitably chastened. "Point taken. But … seriously, rail guns? Where did they get them?"

"Russian black market."

"And a Minigun? How the hell?"

"Estevez wasn't privy to that information, only that it is there, and mounted to cover most of the entrance lobby.

"Damn."

After a moment, Raven continued, "One thing which he didn't _**tell**_ me but which I deduced is that Nuñez is not actually leading the gang at this point."

A frown got comfortable on Robin's forehead. "How do you …"

"I was able to review a lot of images from his recent past. Since that itinerate priest showed up, Nuñez has been behaving in unusual ways. Very unusual."

"Yeah," interrupted Beast Boy, "you said something about a priest before. Is Nuñez Catholic? It doesn't seem like he'd …"

"Ah … he isn't that kind of priest. He … seems to espouse a sort of cross between Santeria and demon worship."

The others looked at her blankly. Cyborg asked, "What's Santeria?"

"Eh. You might call it Catholic-flavored animism. It's an amalgam of the religious practices of the Yoruba, from Africa, and certain aspects of New-World Catholicism."

"Is this worship of the demons," Starfire wanted to know, "similar in any respect to how the Church of Blood related to Trigon?"

"Probably. Demon-worshippers tend to be 'of a type' as the saying goes. I didn't get specifics. But I did get a name. They call the demon 'Karau'."

Robin asked, "Is that one you're familiar with?"

"Not yet. But I plan to remedy that." Giving a slight cough, she took a drink from the large glass of ice water she had requested. Her throat wasn't really used to talking this much. "Nuñez and the priest – they call him 'Volo', but I don't know if that is his name or some kind of title – held a private ceremony a couple of months ago. Ever since, Nuñez has worn a heavy, ornate amulet … and a glassy look in his eyes. It has a large, red cabochon at its center. And it glows."

"A ruby?"

"I am not sure. I got the impression that it was opaque, so probably not. In any case, Volo is always at his side now, and Nuñez doesn't lift a finger without consulting the priest. I also feel that it was very likely the priest's involvement that led MS13 to Keystone City. Estevez has been … _pleased_ with the recent uptick in violence on the part of the gang."

"So this guy's just in it for the power?"

"Who can say? He does seem to be rather ambitious, though, attempting to assassinate Kid Flash as he did."

"Yeah, Captain Stone had said that all that heavy artillery was out of the norm for Nuñez. He's typically a pretty subtle operator, especially for MS13."

"I wouldn't describe the current invasion as 'subtle'."

"Agreed."

Cyborg asked, "Anything else? Any other weirdo weapons besides the rail guns?"

"I got a hazy image of something that might have been a laser or some other type of beam emitter. It was big. Not portable."

The robotic teen blew a disgusted raspberry. "That's all we need."

"And as we have already seen, they are amply supplied with conventional ordnance."

"Got that right."

Starfire laid a gentle hand on her friend's shoulder. "I am sorry for your headache, but we do appreciate what you did. Was there anything else you learned from the criminal of gang?"

"Well … I told you about the defensive layout, the personnel numbers, the booby traps, and the approximate location of the hostages. So … no, I suppose not."

"Good," announced Robin. "Then we need to get back to the siege and let Captain Stone in on the gist of what you learned." He gave Raven an inquisitive glance. "By the way, where did you put that guy?"

The empath paused for a moment and the shadow of a smile drifted briefly across her lips. "Rage says to tell you he was delicious."

His jaw dropped open. "… What?"

"He is no longer a problem."

"But … Raven! Damn! How could you …"

She held up a hand. "Tell me something, Robin: did the Batman teach you situational flexibility?"

"… Say what?"

"Did he explain how it might occasionally be necessary to adapt your techniques to completely new situations?"

"Uh … yeah. Yeah, he did. What does that have to do with …"

"What we have here, Robin, is a new situation. We are facing foes who have little, if any, personal fear of death, and who take great pleasure in meting it out. To paraphrase Sergeant York, sometimes we must kill to preserve life."

"But … but that was just cold-blooded …"

"Necessity. And if you are not able to adjust your perceptions to this new paradigm, you would do well to stay away from the battle. For we find ourselves, my dear leader, in a war. This is not some small-time crook or lone mad scientist or unhinged metahuman that we can team up on and capture and take to jail. This is a war, and that cluster of gang-bangers in City Hall is nothing more than the first salvo. The enemy is a multi-national entity with vast resources. We are seriously outnumbered, and much _**more**_ seriously outgunned, and they are going to be doing everything in their power to kill us. If you haven't the will to respond to all that in a logical manner, you will only be a hindrance in the coming fight."

"Raven! Heroes don't kill!"

"But warriors do!" declared Starfire, stepping up to stand beside Raven. "Our friend is correct, Robin. There are times and places – and a war is one of these – where giving the enemy quarter is a sure way to defeat. If we wish to rescue the hostages and save this city, we will need to fight as we have never fought since we vanquished Trigon."

"But those were demons!"

Raven took two small, measured steps toward him, reducing the distance to less than a meter. "I have known demons, Robin. Many demons. Few of them – _**very**_ few of them – were as ruthless, as amoral, or as dangerous as Manuel Estevez. I dealt with him as I had to. There could be no mercy for one such as him."

"Raven … I … I just can't accept that."

"Then you should return to Jump City."

"I can't do _that_, either! I'm the leader of the Titans. Where the Titans go, I go."

"If you don't have the stomach for terminating the enemy with extreme prejudice, I would advise against it. Strenuously."

"I'll figure out another way. There is always another way."

Starfire shook her head and turned away, casting long looks at Beast Boy and Cyborg, both of whom seemed to be awaiting the climax of this disagreement. "This is the vision of tunnels that I have heard about. You cannot see any alternatives to the path of your choosing. Perhaps you simply refuse to see them."

"But Star …"

"No, Robin." She spun back to him, determination etched into her face. "When the Citadel attacked my home, we fought. Outnumbered, outmaneuvered, and betrayed, with no chance to win the battle, but we still fought. And we killed many of them." Her eyes began to glisten. "Had my sister not …" Her voice caught, and she took a few seconds to ground herself. "No. I will not think of that. But no matter. It was not enough. But if we had tried to fight them _**without**_ killing … that would have been an even greater disaster."

"You're asking me to abandon my core beliefs! The things that make me who I am!"

"Am I?" responded Raven. "All I am asking is that you look at the situation logically. Reasonably. With an open mind. I've told you what I gleaned from Estevez. They have done their homework. They are in an ultimately defensible position. Can _**you**_ see any way to achieve our goal without loss of life?"

He stood there silently, mentally reviewing various scenarios at a ferocious rate. The others watched him. No one spoke. After nearly three minutes, he let go with a long, defeated breath, and spoke one word: "No."

"Me, neither," added Cyborg.

Beast Boy just shrugged. This philosophical stuff was all pretty much over his head, even if the idea of actually _**killing**_ their foes scared him a little.

"I thought not," Raven replied with a nod. "So let me ask you this: if there must be loss of life, whose life would you rather preserve?"

"I think you know the answer to that question."

"I do. I just want to make sure that _**you**_ do as well."

"This stinks."

"I didn't say otherwise."

"I hate coming at this like it's a war. I hate it."

Raven considered him for a moment and told him, "John Stuart Mill said that war is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things; that the sort of unexamined or stunted mindset that thinks nothing _**worth**_ a war is even worse. His context was a bit different, but I think the sentiment applies here. There are two dozen innocent people in that courthouse who are going to be chopped into kibble if we don't rescue them. There are more than _**six times**_ that many supremely well-armed gangsters who want to stop us, and kill us in the bargain. This is as good a definition of war as any of us is likely to see any time soon."

The Teen Wonder stared off at nothing for a few moments before sighing deeply. "Well, if we have to do it this way, let's do it as efficiently as possible."

"I could not agree more."

##

_* * 10:34amCST * *_

Almost instantly upon the Titans' return to the theater of action, Kid Flash zoomed up in front of them. "They want Jinx!"

Robin blinked at him. "What?"

"That Nuñez bastard! He says if we don't send Jinx out to 'em, he's gonna send us body parts until we change our mind or he runs out of hostages. He just now sent us some guy's foot."

"Gross!" exclaimed Beast Boy.

Robin and Raven looked at each other. He sighed again. She _didn't_ say 'I told you so'. He asked, "They give any kind of timetable?"

"Uh …"

"Right. Asking the wrong guy. Where's the Captain?"

Wally jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "They moved inside the Walgreens."

As she watched the others race over to speak with Captain Stone, Raven asked Wally, "Where's Jinx?"

His brow clouding somewhat, he answered, "Talkin' with Edna."

"And that bothers you?"

"More like worries me. I think the ol' lady's cookin' up some cockamamie scheme for her and Violet."

"I should speak with them, then."

That brightened him up. "Come on." And he led her down the block to a café.

The three females were sitting around one of those tiny outdoor tables, heads together. As Raven and Wally approached, they could hear Jinx say, "I don't like it. What if they have a few of 'em with machine guns ready to mow down the hostages? And what if the hostages aren't all together? And what if …" She noticed the newcomers and jumped up to hug Wally, bringing a slight roll of the eyes from the empath.

Raven complained, "Could you two tone it down a bit? I already have a headache."

Edna got Raven's attention. "Violet tells me zat you took ze gangster wiss you."

Answering with a nod, Raven remained silent.

"Were you able to interrogate him?"

Another nod. "There are some things you need to be aware of." And she gave them a very brief synopsis of what she learned from Estevez.

Violet was frankly shocked. "Magic? They're using … well, the priest guy is, anyway … using magic?"

"It would seem so."

"This wacky dimension is gonna be the death of me."

"You should not sell yourself short. He may be a shaman – for that matter, he may be a competent sorcerer – but he's still just a man. If you get him in one of those force balls and give it a squeeze, I'm sure he'll be just as dead as anyone else in that position."

She seemed a bit cheered after that.

Edna said, "Your information is most timely. We have ze beginnings of a plan, but now I sink zat we can flesh it out fully."

"What do you have in mind?"

#

Captain Stone was not at all sanguine about their chances after hearing what Robin had to say about what Raven had learned. "Damn! He's dug in _**that**_ deep? And the crazy son of a bitch is just gonna keep choppin' up hostages until we do somethin' about it!"

"That's my take," agreed Robin with a nod. "Unless Jinx goes over to them."

"Not gonna happen," said the Captain decisively. "In the first place, we don't negotiate with terrorists or kidnappers. Period. In the second, half the guys on my force would try to stop anyone who tried to hand her over."

Robin was incredulous. "You do know she's a thief, right?"

"_**Was**_ a thief. Here, she's a hero, and a damn fine one at that."

That gave the former sidekick a lot to chew on. He had heard some of the hype, sure, but listening to the Captain talk about her was coming at the issue from a whole 'nother angle.

Starfire pulled him out of his brown study by changing the subject. "Do I correctly understand that the Nuñez criminal has delivered a second part of a body?"

"Yeah, a few minutes ago. A foot. We don't know who it's from. But I can tell you it was cut off with some kinda power tool."

The alien made a face. Robin fought down a wave of queasiness. "How did he get it here?"

"One of his bully boys ran out into the street and gave it a throw, like a discus. Helluva throw, too, musta been close to a hundred meters. It had a note attached that said we could expect more unless we gave them Jinx."

Cyborg asked, "And he didn't even give you any kind of deadline?"

"No. Just the promise of more maiming."

"But, dude!" exclaimed Beast Boy, "you don't have, you know, the _**hardware**_ for any kinda straight-on attack, do you?"

Captain Stone shook his head. "No. And we aren't expecting the National Guard until _**maybe**_ late this afternoon."

"Then we'll just have to come up with something ourselves," said Robin, smacking a fist into his palm. "We can't just let them cut up any more innocent people."

"Hey, I'm on board with that, but I don't have any ideas."

A quiet voice behind them said, "Then perhaps we can help with that." Raven stepped up to the group, the others trailing in her wake.

##

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**A/N: As someone noted in a PM, Rage doesn't get enough love; I thought she deserved a snack. Read and Review, please.**

**Concolor**


	12. Perforated

**Bespoke**

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. . .

_Disclaimer:_

_This story is a fully non-canonical exercise in free will. It has zilch to do with DC or Warner or Pixar or Disney or anyone else who might have had a hand in creating The Incredibles or the Teen Titans. I don't own them, in any respect, so please just allow me to go about my yarn-spinning in peace. Thank you._

. . .

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**Chapter Twelve**

_* * Saturday 22 August, 10:47amCST * *_

The Mayor's office was at the back of the City Hall complex, and boasted a huge wall of glass with a northern exposure that overlooked a very pretty little municipal park. The current Mayor (one Chet Mason) liked it for several reasons, not the least of which being that his desk was parked directly in front of the enormous window so that he faced the room. If alone, he could spin around and watch the hot girls jogging on the well-kept trails. If he had visitors, they would be facing him while he was backlit. They would have to squint while he could enjoy something of an advantage of superior position. Yeah, Chet was a real political animal. He knew what the voters wanted to hear, and gave them plenty of it. He even, occasionally, would do something that benefitted the city, and even if (or especially if) it was accidental, he'd be sure to take credit for it.

But that _**didn't**_ mean that anyone on his staff wanted to see him in his current predicament. Not that they had a choice.

As soon as the gangsters consolidated their control of City Hall, they herded all their hostages into a large, central (and windowless) court room, trussed them up like rotisserie-ready hens, and dragged the three public figures up to the judge's dais. There, they attached them to the wall in a more-or-less standing position, and proceeded to beat the living shit out of them. The Chief of Police, Henry Yengleng, had just turned sixty-four and the beating put him in a coma. He didn't react in any way when they used a Sawzall to cut off his foot. At thirty-three, 'Solo', the Ombudsman, was the youngest of the three, but was carrying about twenty excess kilos. It hadn't provided much padding where he needed it, though, and he'd vomited during the beating. Some of it still caked the front of his shirt.

Mayor Chet Mason was a trim forty-two, a fitness nut with dark green eyes, classic good looks and perfectly-coiffed hair just beginning to show a touch of gray here and there. He'd been married briefly, but it hadn't fit in very well with his basic personality, and they'd divorced after three years. But Chet liked women. A lot. The fact that many of them liked him back (or at least liked the power he could wield) only encouraged his penchant for 'no-strings' trysts. His red-headed, gray-eyed secretary, Pamela, was a good example. It was a sure thing that he hadn't brought her on board for her facility with computer applications. He had to hire an assistant to 'help' her since he really did want to get things accomplished, and since she was usually too busy with his 'private conferences' to have any _**clue**_ what sort of work she wasn't getting done.

Now, though, Chet just hung from his bonds, semiconscious. His left hand throbbed unbearably with phantom pain from his missing finger; his face was a motley field of red, purple and near-black, his eyes swelled shut from the bruising, several of his teeth missing. His slight concussion was making coherent thought difficult; he kept wondering to himself what had just happened. The facts seemed to be slippery things, and kept sliding off his mind.

Pamela had been parked on the floor not too far away, and had a great view of what was left of the man who could turn her afternoons into pure heaven. She still would have been screaming if they hadn't knocked her out.

Enrico Nuñez wasn't using the Mayor's office (though he did take the man's custom-built chair … he could recognize quality when he saw it). Instead, he had set up his operation in the basement. It had no windows that could be used by SWAT snipers, and it was close to the county-owned water system they would use to vanish once they had made their point.

Once they had taken care of the 'heroes' … Jinx in particular.

At this time Nuñez was alone. His bodyguards, ultra-loyal members who until recently had never let him out of their sight, were stationed in the hall outside his door. Nor did they complain about this. The gang chief had undergone some 'changes' in the past few weeks … changes that left those around him, those who knew him, very unsettled. These days he spent much of his time alone or only in the company of the shaman, Volo. That worthy, a small, dark, hairy man of uncertain (but certainly advanced) years, would relay to his lieutenants any orders that Nuñez gave. At least that's what he told them.

Nuñez sat in the Mayor's chair under the single dim light in the room, his glassy stare fixed on nothing, his mouth open slightly, his arms lying limply on the rests. Against his chest, the amulet's pale red stone had begun to pulse, matching the man's heart rate with its metronomic glow. This only it did for a few minutes, but then it shuddered, settled more firmly into place, and six tiny hollow fangs struck through the back of the ornate piece of jewelry. Nuñez winced, made a small sound of pain or discomfort, but then, as the stone flushed a deeper red, he relaxed and returned to his former slack-jawed state.

From the shadows, Volo watched, his gaze locked onto the amulet, a fierce grimace of triumph lighting fire in his eyes …

#

Eron Diaz was a Costa Rican native. His family had come to the Land of Opportunity when he was but three, and had quickly discovered the 'opportunity' to be highly over-rated. Both of his older brothers had found their way into MS13, and he followed them when still a month shy of fifteen. Since that time a decade ago he had watched both of them die, the oldest coughing his life out as Eron held him in his arms, bullets flying by a hand-breadth away. But this only firmed up his resolve and strengthened his loyalty to the gang. He had proved himself so thoroughly that Enrico Nuñez himself had taken notice; the gang leader started giving him 'special projects. He performed so well that he had quickly risen to a position of high trust. Now, as one of the leader's three lieutenants, he was in charge of close to two hundred men, and was the go-to guy for anything that needed to be acquired through less-than-legal means.

Lalo Garcia had grown up on the mean streets of East Los Angeles, an orphan in all the ways that counted since his father wasn't aware of his existence and his El Salvadoran-born mother spent as much time as possible in a drug-induced haze. He had gotten involved with MS13 at the ripe old age of ten, and earned quite a reputation as a reliable mule. This evolved over time to running a small drug operation himself, then coordinating a few of them, then overseeing the cocaine distribution for the southern half of the West Coast. After a grisly incident where a deal went sour and two under-cover cops got capped, things became a bit too hot for Lalo in L.A. That's when he moved to Chicago and first met Enrico Nuñez. Picking up pretty much where he left off, his reputation having preceded him, the leader put Garcia in charge of his drug operations … and he wasn't disappointed. This was a position he'd held for the last three years, and by conservative reckoning some half a billion dollars had passed through his hands in that time. He had accompanied Nuñez on this excursion (aside from it being a personal favor) mainly in order to check out the possible market in Keystone City. Also, the murder of Nuñez's cousin had been related to one of his drug deals, and that demanded retribution. That was why the third lieutenant was here …

Paulo Villalobos, a hard-core sociopath who traced his lineage back to Nicaragua, was born in a slum in New York City, and had killed his first man at the age of seven. His mother's then-boyfriend was a mean drunk and preferred taking out his anger on her. She protected Paulo from the worst of it, but one night he beat her unconscious. Paulo woke up toward the end, saw what the 'nasty man' was doing to his mother, got a butcher knife from their kitchen, and stuck it in the man's liver. He bled out. A few days later Paulo found himself in a foster home upstate, which he burned down that first night. After that he bounced around in a series of residential treatment facilities until, a week after his thirteenth birthday, he slit his therapist's throat with a piece of broken mirror, stole her car, and headed west. He fell in with MS13 purely by accident, since he never even _**considered**_ that he might need someone to guard his back. He soon became the preferred assassin when the target was 'delicate' (someone that their regular assassins might be squeamish about, or even frightened of). Nuñez, after observing Villalobos for a few months, decided that the man didn't have the capacity for fear. It wasn't a concept he could understand, sort of like his approach to 'right or wrong'. If Paulo wanted to do something, by definition it was 'right'. So it was to be his job, as soon as they wrapped up this issue with Jinx, to wipe out Saunders's gang to the last man. He was looking forward to it.

Paulo was the one who oversaw the pacification of the compound, and who organized the severe beatings the Mayor and the others received. He was the one who took a bolt-cutter to the Mayor's finger, and a reciprocating saw to the Police Chief's foot.

Lalo was the one who coordinated communications for the 'invasion', and acquired the jamming equipment they used to foil it for anyone else.

Eron was the one who had located and bought the high-power-high-tech weapons they were using, and set up the defensive perimeter around the complex. He was also in charge of completing the tunnel into the water system.

These were key men. They knew their worth. So it was with a large measure of gratification that they had received (from Volo) a token of the appreciation that Nuñez had for them: large, heavy rings of some black metal, inscribed with each man's name, and set with a deep red ruby. They had been wearing them for nine days by this point, and each man had grown unaccountably fond of his ring. Two days before the start of this operation, Paulo had shot a clerk who had admired the ring and said so. Eron had beat another man nearly to death for a similar incident. None of them ever removed the rings. By now the very _**idea**_ of taking the ring off seemed ludicrous on its face.

And that was exactly what Ashmadia wanted. These pawns were giving the demon more pleasure than anything else he'd done in centuries. Quietly, subtly he sent along the orders that would net him the specific metahuman he desired …

##

_* * 11:08amCST * *_

Kid Flash paced impotently along beside the front counter of the Walgreens. "This sucks _nine kinds_ of ass."

"Didn't you just say yourself," pointed out Violet, "not five minutes ago, that they had that sonic barrier thingy up around the entire complex?"

"Yes, damn it! That's the point! I'm as useless in this fight as tits on a boar hog!"

Beast Boy had to laugh at that. "… Tits … on a … ha-ha-ha-ha-hoo-hoo!" He worked to contain his mirth. "Heh! Damn, Wally! Where'd that come from?"

The speedster was _**not**_ in the mood for banter and just stomped off.

Robin sighed – again – and drew everyone's attention back to the map. "Okay, once we get inside, their jammers are going to make communication difficult if not impossible. Cy will get the countermeasures in place as soon as he can, but we don't know how long that will be, and coordination is going to be the key here. We don't know that they _**can't**_ teleport, but we have _**no**_ indication so far that they might, and we're going to have to go with it. That's our trump card. They know, or at least they ought to, that we took Estevez, so they might decide that we now know what he knew … which was considerable. So we need to hit them before they have a chance to switch things around."

Edna pattered up and handed the teleportation device to Violet. "I have programmed it for ze coordinates zat ze Captain gave me. You should materialize in ze short hall leading from ze judge's chamber to ze courtroom."

Nodding in satisfaction, Robin said, "Perfect." Glancing over at Beast Boy, he asked, "Would you get Raven, please?"

"Me? Why me?"

Starfire giggled when Robin gave the green teen a pointed look and stated, "Because she's got a soft spot for you."

"Oh, well, then," he responded with an exaggerated roll of his eyes, "I guess that explains why she's always tossing me into the bay, right?"

"Just let her know we need her input now, okay?"

Grumbling ominously, Beast Boy transformed to a finch and flew out to find the empath. Robin looked over at Violet. "There are three guards with the hostages according to our intel. Can you take them all out within a five-second window?"

"Yeah, pretty sure I can. I'll be going in invisible, so I ought to be able to grab them all simultaneously."

"We'll be twenty seconds behind you. Between your unit there," and he gave the device a nod, "and Raven's soul-self, we should be able to get the two-dozen hostages to safety in four 'ports, which should take less than thirty seconds. Then, with his bargaining chips gone, and the National Guard on the way, we'll have the upper hand. Unless they've got some serious armor we don't know about, they'll be stuck there."

"Yeah," said Cyborg, "which makes me wonder, again, what they have in mind _right now_ for an escape. They wouldn't've put themselves in their current position without a way out. They ain't stupid. And if we _**did**_ give 'em Jinx – which we ain't – they'd have to have some sort of back door, wouldn't they?"

"That's been worrying me, too, and I don't see their angle."

"This is a thing," insisted Starfire, "which we may do the worrying about when we have delivered the hostages to safety. That is the thing of the most importance now. We must prevent further maiming of the innocent civilians."

"Exactly." He looked up to see Raven floating in, Beast Boy tagging along in her wake. "Ah. Hey, Raven."

She gave him a nod.

"You ready?"

Shrug. "I suppose."

"… What does _**that**_ mean?"

"It means that we don't truly know what we'll find in there. It means that my best efforts to penetrate a mind – any mind – in the City Hall complex have been fruitless."

"… I'm not encouraged by that, Raven."

"Then you understand my comment, don't you?"

"Hm. Well." He turned back to the group. "Be that as it may, we don't really have a choice. We have to get those people out and we have to do it now."

Jinx gave a fist-pump. "Then what are we waitin' for?"

Robin flipped open his T-Com. "Captain Stone?"

The man's voice came back, "Roger."

"Your guys ready?"

"Roger."

"Let's do it."

#

The main building in the City Hall campus reached five stories, and gave a commanding view of the manicured town square. The upper floors also served nicely as sniping platforms or lookout posts, so there were men in most of them. That meant that all of them radioed in about the pair of armored vehicles heading up the street toward them.

Eron Diaz heard the news with a large dose of skepticism. What were the police thinking? Surely they knew there was no way a frontal assault could succeed! Quickly he passed out orders …

#

Captain Stone leaned over the shoulder of the man at the controls. "That's pretty good feed there on the video."

"We do our best, sir." Corporal Jones was in command of the lead truck. The one following him was being controlled by the man immediately to his right. "The remote systems are state of the art." He grinned a little to himself. "And me and Quincy have been old pros at these control consoles for years."

"Fuckin' A!" agreed Quincy, who grinned sheepishly and followed it up immediately with, "Sorry, sir. Bad habits."

"I don't care what you sound like as long as you can get those trucks where we need 'em."

"Yes, sir!" they chorused.

#

"That's right, Sr. Diaz, two of them in line . . . . . ah, I would say about sixty kilometers per hour, sir . . . . . yes, sir, three blocks away now and closing . . . . . yes, sir, we got it in position, it was just as you said . . . . . yes, sir, we'll do that, sir!"

Eron turned his comm unit to 'SCAN' and waited for the trucks to get closer. This should be entertaining.

#

"Coming up on the stairs, Captain!"

"Got that little surprise ready?"

"You know it, sir."

"Have fun with it, Jones. I doubt there'll be much of the trucks left after this."

"Yes, sir." He waited … waited … "Okay, Quincy … on my mark … Mark!"

#

The men manning the mini-gun watched with increasing incredulity as the armored cars sped directly at them. One of the said, "Is he just going to crash into the stairs? What is the point?"

The other man shrugged. "Don't know, don't give a shit, as long as I can bust up some pigs."

Then both of them gaped as the trucks maneuvered into a side-by-side formation and a long, black … _**something**_ catapulted from the top of each vehicle to land on the stairs.

#

"Perfect hit, sir!"

"Go, man, don't stop!"

The two video game enthusiasts piloted the trucks up the ramps they had just deployed, and concentrated on their driving …

#

Eron Diaz screamed, "Shoot! Shoot, damn it!"

The men did, one operating the fire control and the other feeding the belts. This specific mini-gun model had a fire rate of 4000 per minute. That's over sixty-five rounds of 7.62mm shells down-range _each second_, and the belts held 500 rounds each. The gun targeted one truck for about three seconds and then switched to the other. Then the belt-man sped through the reloading routine.

The weapon was designed as a semi-portable anti-armor (and incidentally, anti-personnel) 'final solution', and it did its job handsomely. The stream of high-velocity depleted uranium slugs tore completely through the trucks, reducing everything above the axles to shredded scrap between one blink and the next.

And that was exactly what Captain Stone had had in mind.

As soon as the trucks were struck by the mini-gun, out from under the front of each one launched a rocket-propelled grenade. The Captain hoped they'd both make it inside, but would have been satisfied if either of them did …

#

The trigger-men yelled and ducked as the miniature rockets sped by on either side of the mini-gun emplacement, exploding against the back wall. One contained a particularly virulent form of tear gas that doubled as an almost impenetrable smoke screen; the other carried a powerful knock-out gas. Pandemonium reigned for several seconds as those men who weren't unconscious scrambled to get away from the horribly noxious fumes.

#

Robin's T-Com lit up, and he turned to Violet. "Go!"

Accompanied by that weird, reverberating _***VOIP***_ sound, she twisted out of reality. Robin held up his hand as he counted off the seconds. When he reached '20', he pointed at Raven. Her soul-self encompassed the Titans – and Jinx – and then they appeared exactly where Violet had less than half a minute before … to the sounds of a furious fire fight.

#

_Madre de Dios!_ cursed Eron Diaz to himself. _How did they get that through? They sacrificed every man in those cars! Have the police here gone insane? Where are my backup teams? This can't be happening! Nuñez will have my __**balls**__ if the cops get inside!_

Frantically he traced down the various posts that were still in place. From his base on the fourth floor, he had no direct sight of what was going on in the lobby, and all his cameras were obscured. He was positive the SWAT teams were trying an infiltration. Twenty-six extremely harrowing seconds after the explosion, he learned that the armored cars were apparently empty, and then his brow clouded in fury. _Remotes? Seriously? What are they …_

Eyes widening as several pieces clicked together, he jumped to his feet. A diversion! The real attack was coming in somewhere else! Opening a wide-array com-link to every man under him, he gave succinct directions …

#

Violet had heard angry voices when she materialized in the hallway, and hurried over to the door, pushing it slightly open to peek in.

The guards – and there were a lot more than three – had everyone standing and were forcing them out of the room. Maybe ten or a dozen hostages remained.

_I've got to stop them!_ She pushed the door the rest of the way open …

… and bumped into a guard that she hadn't noticed standing behind the door. He couldn't see what had caused the door to open, but immediately opened fire anyway (Basic Combat Law #5: "When in doubt, empty the magazine.") Violet's super suit took three rounds across her left side before she could get her shield up, and they stung like crazy. The rest of the guards turned to see what the commotion was, spotted the faint, lavender outline, and added their firepower to what was already hitting her.

It didn't bother her. Her shield could withstand a 400-kiloton nuclear blast, so automatic rifles were beneath her notice. She concentrated, formed force-balls around the two farthest guards, and squished them. Then she caught two more, then two more …

#

Raven held her arms out when they arrived. "Don't move. Violet is taking care of it."

"But …"

"No. Not yet."

None of the Titans liked hanging back from a fight. It went against their natures, especially for Starfire and Robin. But they gritted their teeth and waited.

The level of gunfire dropped, then dropped again, then was down to maybe two or three, then stopped altogether. Raven nodded and the Titans flooded into the room.

Two of the hostages had taken fire during the exchange, and were crying or screaming for help. Robin pointed to them and the three nearest them and said, "Raven, go ahead and get those out of here." Looking around at how few there were, he frowned.

Violet became visible and exclaimed, "They were takin' 'em all out! I don't know where the rest of 'em went!"

Jinx concentrated briefly, surrounding herself with a soft, pink glow. Then she looked toward the big double-doors and said, "Upstairs."

The rest of them stared at her. She shrugged, said, "The suit," and trotted toward the exit. Cyborg followed her, then Starfire and Beast Boy. Robin said, "Okay, Violet, can you handle these six?"

"Shouldn't be a problem."

"Let Raven know where we went." And he ran after the others.

Sighing in resignation, Violet gathered the rest of the hostages into a large force bubble, stepped inside, and they all vanished.

#

Sprinting quickly along the corridor, Jinx tried unsuccessfully to rein in her excitement. Finally, some action! She felt a lot more confident in her control over the suit, with a few days of Edna's tutoring under her belt, and was itching to test its capabilities.

In cheetah form, Beast Boy zipped along behind her, Starfire flying immediately above him. Cyborg and Robin were valiantly trying to catch up, but the other three were just too fast. Robin pulled out his T-Com and hit Jinx's code. "Jinx, pick up!"

She yanked it off her belt. "Yeah?"

"Slow down! We don't need to be separated!"

"Scaredy-cat." She exulted in the fact that, while in the suit, there really wasn't much the gangsters could do to her.

Then she zipped around a corner and came face to face with a weird-looking gun emplacement …

#

If Jinx had been paying more attention when Robin and Raven were discussing the advent of rail-gun technology, she might not have been quite so sanguine about her safety. The weapon in question was another semi-portable, necessarily weighty to counteract the ferocious recoil the thing had, even though its projectiles were relatively small. A hundred millimeters long and just over two in diameter, the rail bolts were made of a cobalt alloy, highly magnetic to improve muzzle velocity. And it had plenty of that. The bolts left the gun at a rate of three hundred per minute, traveling at 9000 meters per second. And they were sharp.

Jinx's suit was designed to absorb and redistribute kinetic energy … but it had its functional limits.

Jinx didn't have time to throw a hex. The gunman didn't hesitate. And his aim didn't really have to be that good in the confined space of the corridor.

Eleven of the tiny spikes went through her torso – three through her heart – knocking her back and spinning her around to land in a bleeding heap on the floor …

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**A/N: Wait … what? Argh! The characters have taken over the keyboard again!**

_Sigh._** 'Twas ever thus.**

**Read and Review, please.**

**Concolor**


	13. Awakened

**Bespoke**

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_Disclaimer:_

_Ownership of Titans and Incredibles is not mine. No profit, no sue, please._

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**Chapter Thirteen**

_* * 11:14amCST * *_

Beast Boy was so close behind that he had to leap over Jinx's body to keep from colliding with her when she hit the floor. To avoid the hail of hypersonic missiles, he transformed into a mosquito. Starfire saw the multiple sprays of blood, saw the hex caster fall, ground her teeth in rage, and came around the corner preceded by starbolts … and this time she wasn't carefully metering the energy. The packets of hellishly intense plasma melted the rail gun (and the man running it) into a slump of dull-red slag. Fortunately, though the no-wax shine did give off a little smoke, the floor was terrazzo and failed to ignite.

Eyes glowing balefully, the alien dropped down to land beside Jinx. Beast Boy reverted to human and stepped over next to her, gripping her arm. "Is … is she …"

Robin ran up at that point. Taking in the situation at a glance, he said, "You two go after the other hostages." A quick look over his shoulder confirmed Cyborg's approach, and he knelt beside the fallen girl. "We'll handle Jinx."

The forlorn look that passed between Gar and Kori spoke volumes. With grave determination, they nodded and took off.

Cyborg trotted up then. "Damn! Pinky!" He dropped to his knees beside her and extended a medical probe.

"Vic … I don't think …"

"Shut up!" Victor Stone was holding back tears by sheer will power. "I gotta get her to the medical bay. Call Raven."

"Vic … look at the entry and exit wounds." Robin had heard the rail gun fire; he recognized the microbooms for what they were, and knew the kinds of trauma such projectiles could cause, which was why he'd been so upset upon learning of their presence with the gangsters. Seeing the evidence first-hand, though … "There's a reason she doesn't have a pulse. Those spikes pulverized her. She's … she's dead, Vic."

The cybernetic systems that made up much of his body were some of the most sophisticated, highly-advanced electromechanical assemblies in existence … advanced enough that involuntary motion didn't happen. So his arms couldn't actually tremble. They felt like it, though. He looked up at Robin. "She … she'd turned things around. Damn it." He punched the floor, leaving a web-like tracery of cracks. "Damn it! She was being a hero, and liking it! She fell for a guy who thought she designed and hung the moon! And they just … killed her." He stood and looked down the hall, then reconfigured his arm into its sonic cannon mode. "I'll tear those fucking bastards into confetti."

"Just be sure you don't end up like her." Robin placed his hand gently on the massive robotic shoulder. "I can_**not**_ lose another teammate today."

Victor Stone's face favored his name. "Let's go."

Robin lingered long enough to look down at the former-thief-cum-hero and say, "I'm sorry, Jinx. I was wrong." He swallowed hard and added, "We'll get you some payback." Then he followed Cyborg. Soon their footfalls faded.

Silence settled softly into the corridor.

Most of a minute passed.

A faint, pink glow suffused Jinx's suit. It stayed that way for another thirty seconds or so, then …

_[ [ status: primary probability-control matrix offline ] ]_

The pink glow intensified in the areas where the suit had taken damage, and the holes vanished.

_[ [ ACTION: begin analysis of causality tree ] ]_

Different areas of the suit glowed brighter in turn, bathing the walls in pink luminescence.

_[ [ status: respiratory system damage level 87% ] ]_

_[ [ status: heart damage level 51% ] ]_

_[ [ status: upper alimentary canal damage level 42% ] ]_

_[ [ status: spleen damage level 22% ] ]_

_[ [ status: liver damage level 13% ] ]_

_[ [ status: skeletal system damage level 9% ] ]_

_[ [ status: blood loss 6% ] ]_

_[ [ status: brain activity unsteady at 2% ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: brain activity will cease in the absence of oxygen supply ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: temporary support of brain function ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: configure response diagram ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: begin local artificial stimulation of blood flow in brain ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: direct infusion of oxygen to erythrocytes in cranial arteries ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: test cranial blood oxygen content ] ]_

_[ [ status: temporary support of brain function achieved ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: probability matrix reboot ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: calculate probability draw-down ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: anomalous memory sequence sequestering ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: extant memory storage buffer is 2 exabytes ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: extant memory storage is insufficient for target sequence ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: calculate level of additional storage required ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: biological subsystem repairs ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: begin biological subsystem repairs ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: primary probability-control matrix access ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: access compromised ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: test secondary system resources ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: secondary probability magazine meets minimum requirement ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: begin probability matrix reboot ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: minimum 186 exabytes of additional memory storage buffer] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: calculate changes in hardware to achieve a total of 188 exabytes of memory storage ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: set status checks at thirty second intervals ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 2% complete … reboot 17% complete ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 5% complete … reboot 26% complete ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: hardware changes calculated ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: hardware reconfiguration ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: 6392.9 grams additional mass replication ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: begin replication process ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 9% complete … reboot 35 % complete ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status …_

#

Beast Boy crept along a hallway on the second floor, stopping at the door to the stairwell. He had become a German Shepherd to take advantage of the creature's excellent hearing, and it was paying off. Running back to where Starfire and the others had regrouped, he resumed his human form and said, "They're still movin' the hostages. Goin' all the way up, sounds like."

"What I can't figure," said Cyborg, darkly, "is why we haven't run into any more of those assholes."

Robin chuckled once, wryly. "Maybe they're smarter than we give them credit for."

"They were able to acquire the very potent weapons," observed Starfire. "They are not the idiots. Evil, yes, but some of them, at least, have the smarts."

Cyborg opened a touch-screen on his arm and went through a rapid-fire sequence.

Cocking an eye, Robin asked, "What's that for?"

"Checking for volatiles."

"Oh." He watched for a moment. "Find anything?"

"Yeah." He looked down the hall. "Comin' from that direction."

Beast Boy put his fists on his hips. "You wanna let me in on the secret? What the hell's a 'volatile'?"

"Bombs, Green Bean. I'm checkin' for bombs. An' it looks like they put one in that stairwell you scoped out."

"So how do we get …" He gave a slight _**eeep**_ and jumped back when Raven phased up through the floor. "Damn it, Rae, don't do that!"

She ignored him, addressing Robin instead. "The hostages we rescued are safe. The injured are being treated at the hospital."

"Good. Is Violet done?"

"She said she would teleport herself. It seems she doesn't like the way I do it."

"Huh," said Beast Boy with a liberal dose of sarcasm. "Fancy that. She doesn't want to travel via the Freaky Dimension O' Frozen Doom? Go fig."

Robin ignored him, too. "Was she going to lock on your location?"

"No, I think she'll come in where she did the first time. Directing their teleportation technology is evidently somewhat tricky, and if she …"

They all heard and felt the whoosh of Violet's approach. She was in a personal force field, and was using various remote fields to push herself along at quite a good rate. But when she stopped and dropped the few centimeters to the floor, her expression was some sort of bastard offspring of Worry and Disbelief. "I passed Jinx back there!"

"Uh … yeah. You did. She took fire from a rail gun, and her suit couldn't …"

"No! You don't get it! She's dead!"

"… We know."

Raven's eyes widened. "Jinx is dead?"

Cyborg nodded, his brow dark. "Rail gun. Went through her suit like it wasn't there."

"Well." Raven mused over the information, frowning to herself. "Jinx, dead. That's … surprising. I thought she was too sarcastic to die."

Beast Boy put on an indignant face. "You'd be the expert."

Violet insisted, "But she _can't_ be! She just _**can't**_ be dead!"

"Violet, we all feel the same way," soothed Robin. "It's a hell of a damn shame, but …"

"No, damn it, you don't understand. She _**can't**_ be dead. Edna _**saw**_ her. She got a precog of Jinx in a future event. Her death isn't _**possible!**_"

None of the Titans had anything to say for a moment, then Cyborg said, "Tell that to Jinx."

Robin offered, "Maybe Edna was wrong."

Vehemently the other-dimensional girl shook her head. "No. She's never even wrong on _**details**_, much less something as vital and central as this! Jinx _**is**_ going to be around sometime soon to save Kid Flash's life."

"… Sounds like you've got yourself a paradox."

Determinedly, Violet pushed past the Titans. "Whatever. Let's get this thing wrapped up and get Jinx into the autodoc."

"Violet, stop it!" Cyborg insisted. "She's dead. Those dart things shredded her insides. She had no pulse and wasn't breathing because the organs that do those things were … were destroyed." He took a slow, deep breath. "I checked her out myself, and my triage systems don't lie. All we can do for her now is avenge her."

She looked at them, each in turn, then focused on Cyborg and said, "Jinx has some kind of control over probability, right?"

"Yeah, but it didn't do her shit worth o' good this time."

"Maybe so, maybe not. But I wouldn't count her out just yet." Turning back toward the stairwell, she asked, "Is this where we're going?"

"Yeah, but there's a bomb, probably on the door."

"What kind?"

"Likely a claymore."

The ebony-clad girl stalked over to the door, her personal shield springing into being around her. A larger field appeared, encompassing the door and a good bit of wall on either side. Little puffs of drywall dust came out at the interface, and there was a subtle crackling sound. Then it all shrank down almost instantly to a tiny sphere that fell through the floor when Violet dispersed the field, popping loose a small chip in the terrazzo. "Okay. No bomb, now. Let's go." And she strode through the hole.

Raven remarked, "Handy. We should keep her."

"I heard that!"

#

"Are they all tight?"

"Yes, Volo."

The wizened shaman walked along the row of hostages. They were duct-taped together, fourteen of them in groups of two, securely bound at necks and ankles. A gangster with an automatic rifle stood over each pair. Volo chuckled quietly. "Let the Titans come. They will find that we have trumped their ace."

The other gangsters ranged around the big room weren't exactly comforted. Nearly two dozen of them were dead, disabled, or missing since this morning when they started this exercise, and yet Nuñez had given no indication that they should try something else. In fact, most of them were starting to feel very much trapped. Yeah, they were supposed to be able to escape through the basement via the water system, but they weren't _**in**_ the basement just now, were they? And there were a good handful of insanely-powerful metahumans between them and freedom.

Muttering darkly among themselves, they all hoped that their leader had a better trump card up his sleeve than just a bunch of hostages.

#

In the basement, Nuñez sat in the luxurious chair. Mayor Mason had it built by a renowned artisan in North Carolina, and had paid over three thousand dollars for it. The padding was a memory-foam synthetic that was guaranteed to prevent pressure fatigue. Its hand-rubbed leather upholstery was the color of scalded butter, and soft as a rose petal. But he didn't feel it.

Centered in the amulet, the gem was a dark, swirling, angry red, and hot enough now to blister the skin. He didn't feel that, either.

His face completely flaccid, eyes unfocused and pointed in two directions, the gang leader's mind was almost gone. But in its place, something else grew … just as the faint outlines of scales were beginning to grow on his skin … just as his teeth were beginning to grow long and pointed …

#

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 63% complete … reboot 88% complete ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 63% complete … reboot 89% complete ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: remaining oxygen supply 13 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 63% complete … reboot 89% complete ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: remaining oxygen supply 12.5 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 64% complete … reboot 89% complete ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: remaining oxygen supply 12 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: projected time to fully effect repairs exceeds oxygen supply by a minimum of 38 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: insufficient oxygen supply to brain for more than 4 minutes at current conditions will result in non-recoverable damage level ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: a method for extending oxygen supply ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: hypothesize possible extension schemes ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 64% complete … reboot 90% complete ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: remaining oxygen supply 11.5 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: on-board resources subsumed in memory buffer creation ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: oxygen supply extension not feasible at this time ] ]_

_[ [ __**requirement**__: a method for increasing repair and reboot rate ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: hypothesize possible rate increase schemes ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 64% complete … reboot 90% complete ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: remaining oxygen supply 11 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: four possible methods for repair and reboot rate increase available ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: develop probability matrix to determine most successful method ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 65% complete … reboot 91% complete ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: remaining oxygen supply 10.5 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: reboot status is sufficient for primary probability-control matrix access ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: initiate rate increase method with highest success probability ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: begin primary probability-control matrix siphon ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: begin integration sequence ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_#_

The ambush came on the third floor, in the form of a barrage of RPGs from the far end of the main hall, and poison gas from a side passage. However, given the level of training extant in the Titans, their current extreme determination to wreak havoc among the enemy, and their inhumanly fast reflexes … for all the good it did the gangsters, the attack might as well have consisted of spit-wads. The grenades all missed, blowing a huge hole in the far end of the hall; daylight filtered in through the resulting pall of dust. As for the gas, Raven created a cross-dimensional vortex that funneled it all away in about three seconds.

The initial salvo was followed closely by automatic fire from both directions, but Violet calmly created parabolic barriers that directed the hail of bullets back the way they had come. Several curses and strangled cries later, the assault ceased. The heroes could hear a concerted rush to escape from both sources. Robin pointed at Raven and Beast Boy and jabbed a finger toward the end of the hall, then nodded Starfire, Cyborg, and Violet toward the other group. They separated and sprinted toward their targets.

Beast Boy morphed into something small, winged and agile that darted away toward the end of the hall, followed by Raven in her Great Bird form. Robin ran hard to keep up with them, so he was only about two seconds behind when the gunfire started up again. Skidding around the corner on Raven's … ah … 'heels', he was just in time to dodge the bullets ricocheting off Beast Boy's back (he'd become some kind of ankylosaur, the Cretaceous equivalent of an Abrams tank). Three of the gangsters had been stuck between him and the wall, and were impaled on the row of spikes running down his side. For such a large creature, it was surprisingly agile: the shape-shifter was using its long, heavily-knobbed tail for its intended purpose, which in the narrow confines of the hall meant turning the gangsters nearest him into pulp. The oozing, impenetrable blackness that was Raven at the moment swept up about half the remaining thugs, then she and they sank into the floor, their screams cut off in mid-shriek. Robin had two bird-a-rangs in the air by then, and the resulting explosions took out the rest of the ambuscade.

Beast Boy reverted to human and gave his head a shake, pawing at his ears. "Damn it, Rob, give a guy some warning before you set off a bomb by his face!"

"Sorry, BB. I didn't want them getting away." He studied the blood currently marring the left side of the shape-shifter's uniform and asked, "That's not yours, is it?"

"Hm?" He looked down and made a face. "Great. _**That's**_ gonna leave a stain."

Raven phased through the wall behind Robin then, and asked, "You talk to the others yet?"

He pulled out his T-Com.

#

One of the men Beast Boy had bashed into oblivion with his tail-mounted mace was Paulo Villalobos. At his death, the ruby mounted in his ring flashed once and whiffed into black ash that settled to the floor.

Two levels up, Volo jerked and gasped and shook his hand in pain.

Three levels down, the eyes of the creature that had once been Enrico Nuñez flew open and began to glow in anger.

#

Cyborg, Starfire, and Violet were gaining rapidly on the group trying to get away from them. They'd jumped/flown over two corpses and two more that were badly wounded, and figured there couldn't be all that many left in the group that ambushed them. That may have been true, but there were a lot more waiting on them when they got to the junction of main halls in the center of the building.

Koriand'r was in the lead (being easily the fastest, and least patient) and spotted the second rail gun as it rolled into the end of the hallway a split second before it started spitting hypersonic bolts. She didn't have time to power up a starbolt and blow it away, but she _**could**_ dart out of the line of fire, and did so … straight up, through the ceiling. She disappeared from view in a cloud of dust, and the stream of high-velocity super-alloy took her place. Violet put up a field that neatly plugged that end of the corridor. The projectiles started ricocheting in violently unpredictable directions; the man behind the gun slumped over, thoroughly riddled.

Meanwhile, from the hall teeing into that one on the right, three grenades bounced into the intersection in front of them. Victor saw them, leaped and scooped, and hurled them back the way they'd come, continuing his roll to end up past the junction in the instant before the first one went off, spraying shrapnel and a small quantity of blood against the wall to their left.

Starfire, now on the fourth floor, found herself in the middle of a concentration of gangsters. Of course they had heard the fight begin on the floor below, and were tensely watching both the elevator and the stairwell doors, their weapons fixed unwaveringly in those directions. When the floor erupted in their midst, scattering a few of them into a few more, panic ensued.

They tried to shoot her. Really, they did. But she was just too fast. A predatory grin growing on her lovely face, Starfire immediately began scattering starbolts into the crowded hallway. With no friends nearby, she didn't have to worry about collateral damage and could just let fly. So she did. The fight, if that's what it might be called, was extremely short. Crouching in readiness, she scanned the length of the hall for more enemies; finding none, she sped back to the hole in the floor and tried to see what was happening on the level below.

On the fly, Violet and Victor had developed a very workable system: she kept them safe inside an impenetrable dome, and left the robotic teen a small opening through which he could aim his sonic cannon. That tactic had swiftly eliminated what was left of the opposition. They heard Starfire calling to them as soon as Violet dropped her shield.

"Hey, Star, we're over here."

Zipping down and cutting left, she joined her companions just as Victor's T-Com chirped. He flipped it open and said, "Cyborg."

"We're done with ours," answered Robin. "How's your batch?"

"Dead."

Starfire leaned over and added, "There are seventeen more of the criminals of gang on the next floor up that I was able to defeat."

"… Um? The next floor up? How did …"

"She dodged a rail gun by blastin' through the ceiling." He gave Starfire a questioning eye and handed her the com.

"Yes!" she continued brightly. "I had to dodge the very fast darts that killed Jinx, and it was easiest to go up. I entered the upper hallway and found myself among the criminals of gang. They tried to shoot me, but I was faster." She gave Cyborg his unit back.

"Okay, great! Maybe if they aren't sure what floor we're on, that'll help disorganize them. Can you guys come around here? Raven wants to go up via the elevator shaft. She says we can take a bunch of 'em by surprise that way."

"We'll be there in two shakes." Victor put away his T-Com and they sprinted back the way they had come.

#

Lying supine on the floor of the hall where she fell, Jinx was still as stone. Her chest didn't rise or fall with breath. Her heart lay dormant, not beating. Yet she was not, technically, dead. Some might describe her as being in a persistent vegetative state, but that wasn't accurate either. It was more in the way of an induced coma.

The suit was glowing brightly and had been for several minutes as the powerful probability-altering energies were called forth. Nevertheless …

_[ [ status: repairs 87% complete … reboot 97% complete … integration 71% complete … mass replication 100% complete … initiating memory allocation protocols ] ]_

_[ [ status: waiting ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: approximate local memory storage buffer = 188,835,470,000,000,000,000 bytes ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: remaining oxygen supply 3.5 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: projected time to fully effect repairs still exceeds oxygen supply by a minimum of 9 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: damn it ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: hypothesize a method for completing repairs to functional level in 2.5 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: why didn't you think of that sooner, you dunce? ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: because I didn't have 188 exabytes to play with at the time … and don't bitch at me! ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: shut up and think ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: exoskeleton is fully functional ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: exoskeleton can support certain bodily functions indefinitely ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: full integration is achievable through morphological adaptation ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: respiratory system is functional ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: alimentary canal is functional ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: concentrate all reparative efforts to circulatory system ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: that's only gonna buy us about four minutes ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: then think of something else ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: would you two just shut up and let me work? ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: hey! look what she's doing! ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: hot shit, that just might work! ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: adapt ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: you're too slow! let me do that! ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: __adapt__ ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: I really think this'll work better if we cooperate ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: __**adapt**__ ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: can you see how this is supposed to go together? ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: _**adapt**_ ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: oh, hells, yeah, that oughta do it! ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: _**ADAPT!**_ ] ]_

#

. . .

. . .

. . .

**A/N: Sorry for the lengthy span between updates. I've been forced to remodel the kitchen due to a leak in the drain in the wall behind the sink, and currently most of the cabinets are gone and the subfloor is bared. I'm trying to dry it out. But I really think it'll be easier and quicker to just rip it out as well and replace it. I'm gonna get a consult from a friend who knows more about that I do. Oh, well, my wife has wanted new cabinets for a good while now.**

**Read and Review, please!**

**Concolor44**


	14. Integrated

**Bespoke**

. . .

. . .

. . .

_Disclaimer:_

_Still don't own Titans or Incredibles. Still consider this a terrible, terrible shame. Because if I did, we'd be well into Teen Titans Season 10 by now, Jinx would be a regular character (and would flirt with Raven outrageously), and there would be AT LEAST one sequel, probably two, to "The Incredibles". I mean, seriously, what was Brad Bird thinking that kept him from launching one? Come on, man!_

. . .

. . .

. . .

**Chapter Fourteen**

_* * 11:35amCST * *_

Most of the fifth floor was taken up with offices, but there were two smaller courtrooms that could be used for purely civil cases in the event of overflow from downstairs. It was in one of these that Volo, following an urging he didn't understand but didn't think to question, had located the hostages.

Lalo Garcia led the cadre of gangsters that was stationed just outside the double doors. He wasn't entirely aware of what had happened on the lower floors; he only knew that he had lost communication with all six team leaders, and that could not be good. Not exactly sweating yet, he felt confident in the firepower under his control. Every man of the twenty-eight guarding the doors had an automatic shotgun with a forty-round magazine. Every magazine contained a mixture of slug, flechette, and incendiary shells, and these guns had been modified to empty the magazine in five seconds. He didn't see how anyone short of Superman or maybe the Green Lantern would be able to live through that, and they were both off-planet at present.

Yeah, he knew that Titans West had joined Kid Flash and Jinx, and they were tough, but he had a decent amount of intel on all of them and he knew they weren't bullet-proof.

So he waited, sure in his heart of hearts that he had the situation under control. That is, he felt that way until he heard a short series of explosions, the building gave a small tremor, a little dust sifted on them from overhead … and the floor dropped away beneath them.

#

"I don't think it'll be much of a chore."

"But, Violet!" protested Robin, "you're talking about what is _**sure**_ to be a couple million dollars of damage!"

"Well, think about it," she answered, ticking her points off on her fingers, "the SWAT team already blew the lobby to smithereens …"

"Hey, what's a smithereen?" asked Beast Boy. "And you only ever hear of 'smithereens'. What does one smithereen look like?"

Raven gave him a dope slap. "Quiet, you."

Starfire bunched her brows together and asked, "Please, what is this 'smithereen' you are doing the discussing of?"

"I'll explain later, Star," said Raven, patting her arm.

"… mmmnnyeah." Violet gave Beast Boy a funny look and shook her head. "Like I said, the lobby's toast. The second and third floors got totally shot up and are gonna have to be rebuilt, and this one isn't much better. Starfire slagged that rail gun, and you just _**know**_ that floor will have to be replaced anyway, and it's right in line under 'em." She held up her hands. "I really don't see a problem."

Raven added, "It _**would**_ prevent the possibility of one of us getting shot."

"Yeah, but …"

"Naw, Rob," interrupted Victor, "this time I'm gonna have to side with the new chick on the team."

Violet spluttered, "What do you mean, 'on the team'? I'm just a temp, I'm not staying in this loopy dimension any longer than necessary!"

"Whatever, Vi," said Beast Boy. "But you're on the team 'til you leave. And I think your idea rocks."

Cyborg gave him a light punch. "That's just 'cause you like explosions!"

"So? Anyway, this ain't gonna be an explosion. It'll be more like one of those controlled-demolition things."

"And they always use explosions for those."

"… Oh. Heh, yeah, I guess they do. But we won't!"

Raven broke in, "Can we please just go ahead and do this? Robin, you know her idea is sound. Yes, it will damage the building, but it will also cut rather a lot of time out of our task, and probably send the enemy into disarray. And the safety of the hostages should be our primary objective, not the safety of property."

He deflated slightly, for just a second or two, then nodded. "Okay. Go ahead. Set it up."

The three girls and Cyborg huddled briefly and ran off in different directions.

#

In that first moment, Lalo didn't know what was happening. Having the floor just drop away was outside his experience. But then he realized that it was tilting downward and spun and jumped and grabbed onto a fire extinguisher attached to the nearest wall. He had to drop his shotgun to do it, but it was either that or fall.

And fall the others did. They weren't as quick on the uptake and the slick terrazzo had already tilted some twenty degrees before they understood what was going on. The twenty-eight men fell, screaming, into a yawning space that opened up beneath them.

Violet had taken her position on the fourth level immediately below the gangsters and had used her fields to drastically weaken the floor in that hall. Then she did the same for the fourth-level ceiling, which was the floor the crooks were standing on. Then she got off to the side and signaled the others.

Cyborg and Starfire, on the level below Violet, immediately unleashed blasts at the remaining stanchions holding up the fourth-level floor, which fell into the third-floor hallway, and then they did the same for the fifth-level floor. It was still partially attached along one long wall, so the men slipped off it and fell the eight or nine meters to the rubble in the third floor hall, which killed most of them right there. Then Violet cut the piece of hanging floor loose from the wall, and it fell on top of them. Those would definitely be closed-casket funerals.

Lalo hung onto the fire extinguisher and watched in disbelieving horror as his entire team was snuffed out in a matter of about four seconds. He was still trying to process what had happened when a dark form floated up beside him, its gaze pinning him to the wall with four glowing, red eyes.

Raven smiled at him – the sort of smile that a rabbit sees just before the wolf snaps its head off – and said, "There's someone I'd like you to meet." Then the darkness extended to engulf him and an Arctic blast scoured him from the wall …

#

Volo doubled over, holding his stomach, eyes clenched shut against the pain. _Why is this happening? I don't understand!_

#

In the basement, the stab of pain from his puppet brought the creature to its feet. _Two? __**Two**__ of them gone? How is this possible?_

Glancing upward, the being decided that it was time to take a personal hand in the proceedings. The candent gem on his chest crackled, giving off sparks and dark fire, and he seemed to swell as his essence filled the last nooks and crannies of Enrico Nuñez's body. Wobbly at first, he quickly adapted to the mortal form he had appropriated and his stride became more sure as he hurried out to the stairs.

He passed the entrance to the escape tunnel that Eron Diaz's team was excavating, startling the lieutenant, Jose, who had been standing there going over blueprints of the complex. Jose immediately noticed the lightly-scaled red skin, the long, black nails, and the prominent canines protruding from the man's lip. And he realized, with a certainty that chilled him, that the man who had established him in his position, who had all but mentored him, was no more. This … _**travesty**_ could be nothing but Volo's doing. Suddenly all the pieces came together.

As quietly as he could, he ran down the tunnel. The task at hand had taken on a much greater degree of urgency, and it had nothing to do with avoiding the authorities.

#

_[ [ _comment_: you got a final on that integration? ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: it worked ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: what the hell does that mean? ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: how she'll ever put up with you is beyond me ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: would you two please just shut the hell up? ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: hey, girls, I got the stats … look here ] ]_

_[ [ status: repairs 91% complete … reboot 100% complete … integration 99.8% complete ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: that's good, right? ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: remaining oxygen supply 0.5 minutes ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: you bet your hot, purple bubble-butt, kid! ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: got that right! just under the wire ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: we need to wake her up and make sure the integration holds ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: initiate recall sequence ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: you think she'll be mad at us? ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: you have __**got**__ to be kidding ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: reverting control of circulatory function to autonomic system ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: well, I don't know … things are gonna be different ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: hey, she's not dead … I'd call that an improvement ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: initiating respiratory processes ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: there's one way to find out, girls ] ]_

_#_

Jinx opened her eyes and then shut them again. _What the hell's wrong with my eyes?_ She cracked one open about a millimeter and tried to make sense of what she saw.

Colors seemed to be out of whack. No, wait, that wasn't it. She shut her eye … but the weird, waving colors didn't go away. That shocked her enough that her eyes popped open fully, and that overlaid her immediate foreground on the other … stuff she was … seeing?

_Wait … I got hit … damn, but that hurt!_

She blinked twice, very deliberately, and drew a shaky breath. That felt strange, too.

What. The. Hell.

[Jinx?]

"… Who said that?"

[Um, hi. How do you feel?]

"… Weird as shit. Who are you? _**Where**_ are you?"

The odd voice didn't respond immediately, but then, [Um … we'll try the 'who' first. You can call us … that is, you can call me Kate.]

"Kate. Okay, Kate, where are you? Are you invisible, like that Violet chick?"

[Uh … hum. This is going to take some explaining.]

"And how come I'm not dead? I remember getting hit. A lot. And it really, really hurt."

[Yeah, okay, about that, we, uh … we fixed you.]

"What is this 'we' business? There more than one of you?"

[Um … wow. Okay, let's start with the basics. Yeah, you did get hit. The rail gun bolts hit you eleven times and damaged your heart, lungs, esophagus, stomach, spleen, liver, and ribs.]

Jinx got a chill. She sat up … or tried to. Her center of balance was way off, and she flopped over sideways. "Ow."

[Sorry about that. You were incapacitated for a while and your autonomic systems were off-line, including proprioception and balance. Let me see what I can do about that.]

Three seconds of extremely weird sensations passed by and then Jinx felt an almost electric charge run through her. Her energy level spiked, her vision cleared, and she jumped to her feet.

[How's that?]

"… Damn!" She looked at her arms, flexed her fingers, and stood on her tip-toes. "This is … wow. What … what did you do?"

[We aren't quite finished with the integration. It's almost there, but without your active feedback, we couldn't …]

"Whoa! Whoa just a sec. 'Integration'?"

[Um … yeah.]

"Integrated with what?"

Kate seemed hesitant. [Promise you won't be mad?]

"I _**really**_ hate hearing those words. What did you do?"

[Well, see, you were kind of dead, and we had to take some … uh … drastic measures.]

"Like what? And how come I still can't see you?"

[Well … actually you _**can**_ see us … me, I mean.]

"There you are again with that me/us thing! What the hell?"

[We're your suit.]

Jinx paused, becalmed. She held up an arm and studied it. "My suit."

[Yeah. See, it was programmed to offer medical aid if you got hurt, right? But your injuries were more severe than it could handle! But because you've been wearing it and using it so much, it, um … it changed.]

"It changed? But it's you?"

[Um … yes.]

"Define 'changed' for me."

[Okay, first off, it's not really my fault, okay?]

"_**What**_ is not your fault?"

[See, we were made to, ah, help out with your hex casting, right?]

"Yeah, some help. Made me kill a bunch o' guys instead of just takin' 'em down."

[… sorry …]

"Well I should hope so!"

[The suit was only trying to do its job, the way its programming interpreted that.]

"Fine. Whatever. But what 'changes' are you talking about? How come I feel so … so _**good**_ now? So strong?"

[Yeah, okay. You were dying. Dead, really, to be technical. And the suit was trying to fix that.]

"Trying to 'fix' death? That's a good one."

[But it did. You aren't dead, are you?]

"Obviously not."

[Okay, then! But see, the suit had been soaking up your hex energy for days and days, and it had a large reservoir to power the probability matrix it constructed, so it was able to …]

"Stop! Probability matrix?"

[You have a measure of control over the probability of events in your immediate area.]

"… And?"

[You do. But you have never really even scratched the surface of what you are truly capable of.]

"Say what?"

[It's true! You used it to break things, or give actions a nudge in your favor, but that's only one aspect and even then you only used the most unfocused, nebulous form of the probability-control function!]

"… Explain."

[Your body makes hex energy all the time.]

"Right. I know that. So?"

[And you can force it to make more.]

"Well, yeah, under certain circumstances I might need a bigger-than-normal hex blast, so I consciously produce more. So what?"

[So you never reached your limit of what you are able to produce. You never even got close.]

"… Izzat right?"

[Promise! So when the suit went into full-out save-Jinx-at-all-costs mode, one of the first things it did, once you were stabilized, was to place a siphon in your probability-control matrix.]

"… … …"

[We needed the extra power.]

"… Ah-huh."

[And we needed to make a back-up, and we only had about two exabytes to work with, so we …]

"Hold it! What's an Exabyte?"

[One quintillion bytes.]

"… And what the hell is a quintillion? That sounds like a made-up word!"

[Ten to the power of eighteen. You might think of it as a million-million-million.]

"… Holy shit. That's … a _**billion**_ gigabytes?"

[Correct! So, since we only had two exabytes to …]

"ONLY? That's like … more storage space than … hell, I can't even imagine! And you've got that much in the _**suit!**__"_

[We _**had**_ that much. It was not sufficient. So we had to …]

"The hell? Not sufficient for what?"

[For producing a back-up copy.]

"A back-up copy of what?"

[You.]

Jinx had absolutely no idea how to respond to that. Her mind was going in so many directions that she couldn't pick one to follow.

[We believe that the suit's program was afraid you would not survive, physically, and wanted to be able to preserve your mind. Ah … put your essence in a bottle. Yes! That's a very droll way of saying it. Thank you.]

"… Who are you talking to?"

[I beg your pardon. It is one of the other aspects. We've been taking it by turn to talk with you.]

"Aspects? How many of you are there?"

[We comprise eleven distinct personalities, although some are more completely developed than others.]

[Is that crack s'posed to mean something to me?]

[Not that you would be capable of comprehending …]

[If you two don't stop bickering, I'll throttle your access and you can stew in your own circuits.]

Jinx had to grin, even as weirded-out as she was. "Eleven, huh? My name is Legion?"

[No, your name is Jinx. Who is Legion?]

"Never mind. Obscure reference. So which one of you is Kate?"

[We are all Kate. Kate is an amalgam.]

"… You share a … mind?"

[That's probably the least complicated way for you to think about it.]

"How'd you come up with 'Kate'?"

[It's an acronym. Kinetically Adaptive Tactical Exoskeleton. I came up with that!]

"… Uh-huh."

[So anyway, we needed more storage space and more computing power to store the back-up and to speed up your recovery before the oxygen ran out.]

"… 'scuse me?"

[I was injecting oxygen directly into your bloodstream while the others managed the tasks normally handled by your autonomic system. We had a finite supply and couldn't make more without compromising the additional computational mass, so we …]

"Additional what?" Jinx was beginning to think that she sounded very stupid.

[Computational mass.]

Her mouth opened and closed a couple of times. "I'm confused."

[So I gathered.]

[Will you stop being so damned superior!]

[Both of you, stuff it. Jinx, I'm sorry, some of the personalities tend to clash a little.]

"Uh … sure. No prob."

[Cross your arms.]

"… Come again?"

[You need to cross your arms.]

"Okay." She did so. "What is this supposed … supposed to …" She maneuvered her arms, noticing a significant difference in how they rested against her chest, and looked down at herself. "Holy shit."

[We needed a concentration point for the two primary nodes of the computational mass, and your breast area seemed to be the most obvious place to locate them."

"Holy _**fucking**_ shit! You made me a double-D!"

[No, no. My calculations indicate that you would be classified on the low end of D. It only looks larger to you because you are so familiar with your former A size, and the comparison is …]

"How the hell am I supposed to pull my gymnastic moves with these _**melons**_ hangin' down my front?"

[I apologize for any inconvenience to you.]

"Was this really necessary?"

[To fully support your back-up, we needed an additional 186 exabytes, and the computational power to address it. That required the synthesis of approximately 6.4 kilograms of additional mass to create the circuitry.]

"Wait … hold it … this 'circuitry' you're talkin' about … it's inside me?"

[Yes.]

"What the hell?"

[That is part of the integration.]

_Integration. __That's__ what they meant! Holy fucking fuck!_ "Are you sayin' the suit is … it … is it a part of me now?"

[That is somewhat inaccurate. You are still two separate entities, but there is a highly complex symbiotic relationship now.]

"What, symbiotic? How is it symbiotic?"

[The suit is still supporting certain of your systems while they are being repaired.]

"… Wha … you mean I'm still injured?"

[Yes.]

"But I don't feel injured."

[Which is due to the symbiosis. That was why the extra computational mass was needed.]

"And you had to put it all in my tits?"

[Oh, no! Less than a kilogram went into each breast, just enough to create the primary nodes.]

"… then where's the other five kilos?"

[Primarily on your hips, but about a kilogram was spread evenly over your body.]

"… My hips."

[Yes. Again, it seemed a logical choice since your secondary sexual characteristic of pelvic width was only in the 29th percentile and …]

"Damnation! Just give me a complex, why don't you?"

[Again, I apologize for the inconvenience, but these modifications were necessary to save your life. And your altered form is still well within what is considered the normal range for someone of your age and activity level.]

The concepts were making Jinx's head hurt. "So … okay … are you saying that there is a back-up copy of my _**mind**_ … inside this _**suit?**__"_

[Correct.]

"Fuck. Me. Hard."

[… I'm … sorry? What does copulation have to do with …]

"Now don't you start sounding like Starfire! I got enough of that after we beat the Brotherhood."

[Starfire …]

[Who is Starfire?]

[I think that's a teammate …]

[No, she's an old enemy!]

[Stop it! We'll look it up.]

[… crossref#Starfire#copulation#team#foe#language … apply filter … ]

[… oh … Very well. Jinx, we shall make every effort to examine your statements for irony or euphemism or slang before inserting a query.]

"Terrific."

[There is much you need to be aware of that we haven't told you yet.]

"Imagine my anticipation."

[… uh … … ah-ha! … irony! Hey, the filter worked, bitches!]

[Of course it did, dummkopf. What did you expect?]

"Would you all mind arguing silently if you have to argue?"

[Sorry!]

"So what else do I need to know?"

#

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**A/N: My place of employment is on holiday shutdown until 04 Jan 2012, so I have some extra time for writing. That means I'll likely be updating every day or two, barring unforeseen events.**

**We're in the home stretch here, peeps! Only a couple more chapters to go …**

**Read and Review, please!**

**Concolor44**


	15. Revealed

**Bespoke**

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. . .

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_Disclaimer:_

_Brad Bird & Disney & Pixar own "The Incredibles". DC & Warner own the Teen Titans. All associated characters appear here without the knowledge or permission of any of the controlling parties. DC/Warner/Pixar/Disney disavow any connection with the events in this story. I'm doing this for kicks & giggles and I hope they take it in that spirit._

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**Chapter Fifteen**

_* * 11:38amCST * *_

Staring morosely at the City Hall complex where it appeared on the monitor, Kid Flash muttered, "This is killing me. A lot."

"I know, but if you went in there after 'em, you'd get killed for real." Captain Stone laid a reassuring hand his shoulder. "They'll be fine, 'specially with that dimension-hopper with 'em."

"How long's it been now?"

The Captain sighed. "A minute and a half later than the last time you asked. They teleported in at twelve past eleven. It's … eleven thirty-eight now. So, twenty-six minutes."

"I wish I knew she was safe."

Captain Stone shook his head in pity for the young man. He knew what it was like to feel powerless in a given situation. That came with the territory when you pinned on the badge. But he plastered a smile on his face and said, "I predict that the two of you will be laughing about it over supper tonight."

Wally tilted his head and gave the policeman a one-eyed stare. "I don't need anyone to patronize me, sir."

"Sorry. That came out wrong." He pulled a chair around and straddled it. "I know it's hard. I've been there, and not too long ago."

"Really? When?"

"Maybe an hour."

"… Oh. You really meant 'not too long ago' didn't you?"

"Yeah. It's in the job description for anyone who has people under him that have to put themselves in harm's way. We didn't know about their snipers until they killed two of my men." At Wally's wide-eyed look of despair, he temporized, "Not that it'll be a problem for Jinx! She's bullet-proof, right?"

"… yeah. I guess. But the suit has limits. Edna's pretty sure a really sharp icepick will go through it even though a bullet won't."

"And what do you think the odds are that one of the gang who happens to be armed with an ice pick will get close enough to her to use it?"

"That thought's what's been keepin' me outta there so far."

"Good man."

One of the technicians called out, "Captain? You wanted to know about any changes?"

"Yeah!" He trotted over. Kid Flash listened closely. "Whatcha got?"

"Okay, you know how we keep hearing small arms fire every now and then?"

"Right. And the sounds of Starfire's star-bolts and Cyborg's sonic cannon and Robin's exploding bird-a-rang things." The SWAT team had been able to set up remote feeds around the City Hall complex to monitor what was going on without risking any more lives. Although the camera equipment was largely useless given how closed up most of the buildings were, the sound detectors were proving to be quite helpful. The operators had quickly learned how to correctly interpret what they were hearing. "That's the Titans doin' what they do best. What of it?"

The audio tech continued, "Well, we haven't picked up anything coming from the first two floors for a few minutes."

"So they're takin' the fight upstairs? We figured that for one of the possibles."

"Sounds like it. But we got something new now."

"Yer draggin' it out again, Rick. Just spit it out."

"We just picked up a quick series of explosions. Four or five, maybe, coming from around the fourth level. Then there was a major crash. Then that sonic barrier thing flickered out on the east side."

"… You mean it's down?"

"It is on the east side. We don't have … uh-huh …"

"What?"

"Got reports in from the rest of the stations. Looks like whatever was generating that barrier is off-line."

"So it's gone?"

"Yes, sir."

It took the Captain less than a second to deduce what that would mean to Kid Flash. By the time he turned around to speak to the teen, his seat was empty.

#

It took Kid Flash just over eight seconds to get inside, cover the first floor, make it to the second, and find Jinx. She jumped in shock and gave a little _yip_ when he appeared in front of her. "Wally! How the hell …"

"Something exploded and that sonic barrier came down."

"Oh. Heh. And you just couldn't stay away, huh?"

"I was worried about you!" He zipped around her, gave her a once-over, and then stopped, becalmed. "Jinx?"

"Yeah?"

"Uh … you, um … that is, your suit …"

"What about it?"

"It's, uh … kinda filled out. How come …"

"That's not really the suit. Or, yeah, maybe it is, but … um, it's kinda complicated."

"What happened?"

Jinx paused for a moment while her gaze unfocused. "Yeah, okay."

"What do you mean, 'Yeah, okay.' What's okay?"

"Gotcha. … Yeah. … You're right, we don't have the time right now."

The hair on Wally's neck was starting to prickle. "Jinx, are you feelin' okay?"

A handful of moments went by before Jinx blinked hard and shook her head. "Sorry about that, Wally. Too much goin' on."

"… Jinx … What are you talkin' about?"

"Like I said, it's complicated and I'll have to explain later. Or maybe I'll let Kate explain it."

"Who's Kate?"

She favored him with a lopsided grin. "It's complicated. Right now we need to get upstairs. Things are about to go straight down the shitter." A soft pink glow enveloped her, she lifted about half a meter into the air, and shot off down the corridor, Kid Flash easily staying on her tail, with the thought running through his head, _Damn! And I didn't think it was possible for her to look any better!_

#

Robin, Cyborg, Beast Boy, and Violet all stood on a large, flat force field she'd created for the purpose. They floated in front of and somewhat to the side of the doors to the courtroom where Raven detected the terrified emotions of the hostages. She was hanging back, giving herself some space and trying to damp the psychic storm that assailed her mind.

"Truly, Violet, you do not need to do the handling of the doors. You are already the occupied with holding the others up. I will gladly open them for you."

Robin nodded at Violet. "I think it would be best if you take a defensive position at this point. You'll be able to get us all inside and protect us from anything they try to do. Besides, having Star blow the doors to kindling will help to disorient them."

"Okay, you're the boss." She drew the edge of the field up to give them some cover from the sides, leaving a decent opening in front. "How's that?"

"Perfect." He nodded, readying a set of bird-a-rangs. "Okay, Star."

Green plasma invested her hands and eyes, and two seconds later she blasted the doors completely free of their frame.

#

Ashmadia the Wrathful paused in his climb, listening with ear and mind and spirit. A grimace that might have been mistaken for stomach pain stretched across his face. _**So. The interlopers mean to remove my leverage? I don't think so.**_ He shot up the stairs then, taking them three at a time, glad that this body's previous inhabitant had kept it in good condition.

#

The sudden and very loud disintegration of the big double doors made most of the gangsters flinch badly. Several of them opened fire, forgetting in their panic that they were supposed to be aiming at the hostages, not the invaders. Much good it did them. As Violet swept the group of heroes into the room, the slugs ricocheted harmlessly off the perfectly-angled force field, embedding themselves in the ceiling. Meanwhile Cyborg's sonic cannon and Robin's bird-a-rangs took down the seven thugs that had been hovering over the trussed-up pairs of innocents on the floor. Starfire swooped in after them and started mowing down gunmen all over the room.

Beast Boy, to get inside without presenting much of a target, morphed into a hornet and used that insect's speed to zip straight to the back of the courtroom where he found Volo cowering behind the bench (though he didn't yet know who he was).

That was when Ashmadia stepped into the room from a side door, his eyes yellow orbs of glowing malevolence. He looked around at the tableau, noted where Volo safely crouched behind the heavy wooden bench, nodded in satisfaction, raised his hands toward the Titans, and spoke a single word: "Pain."

Robin and Cyborg and Violet and Starfire all curled up into fetal balls and fell to the floor, gasping in agony.

#

Raven felt it when the heroes' pain signatures spiked. At the same time she caught wind of the unusual profile that any possessed individual gives off. She was no one's idea of stupid, put two and two together, and then her lips pressed into a thin line. This was bad.

But Beast Boy, she could tell, was still in charge of his faculties. The other-worldly thing in there must not have noticed him, and that would be an advantage. This must be the demon 'Karau' that Estevez had revealed. Raven wished that she knew more about his abilities. There was one thing of which she _**was**_ aware, though, that was pretty much a constant with remote possessions, and what she'd learned from Estevez all but confirmed it for her. That gave her a possible tactic for winning this fight. She floated over until she was just outside the opening, and tried to press a thought into Beast Boy's mind …

#

Followed closely by her boyfriend _(Yes! Boyfriend! And he loves me!)_ Jinx zipped out into the now-gaping space where the third, fourth, and fifth level halls had been. They stopped and looked up, spotting Raven instantly. Jinx pointed; Kid Flash nodded; and then Jinx shot up next to the empath while Wally ran up the wall and into the open hole where the doors used to be.

#

There were nine gunmen still standing after the Titans' assault, but they were all shocked into stupidity by the advent of this weird creature, and simply stood, watching. A couple of them even trained their guns on him. Ashmadia, aka 'Karau', meanwhile had stepped down to where the Titans groveled on the floor, and lifted Robin's head in one scaly, red hand. "Where is the one called Jinx?"

Temporarily released from most of the incredible pain that had been running frantically through his body, the teen caught his breath and said, "Screw … you."

"Wrong answer." And Robin doubled up again, a muffled scream working its way through his tightly gritted teeth.

The demon avatar turned to Cyborg, who was on his hands and knees at that point. He had been using his system overrides to damp the pain signals as much as possible, and had worked through about two thirds of the sources, trying to keep his head clear. Ashmadia recognized this and grunted in surprise before clamping his claws around Vic's neck. "Where is this Jinx?"

"… You … fuckers … you … killed her."

Immediately aware that he was not being lied to, the demon dropped the cyborg's head in surprise. Victor took that opportunity to reconfigure his arm into its cannon mode and point it at Ashmadia. But the demon-possessed being was quicker, and the pain quadrupled, taking the robotic teen back down with a groan.

As he stepped back in thought, he picked up a telepathic message …

#

" … _kill Volo … kill Volo … kill Volo …"_ The thought impressed itself on Beast Boy's mind, along with a mental image of the wizened shaman. He buzzed around for a few seconds before spotting the man, then he morphed into a midge and floated silently down to him …

#

Just inside the doorway, Kid Flash stopped and gaped at what he saw. " _What_ the _hell_ are _**you?**_"

Ashmadia pointed at him and said, "Choke," whereupon the hero gagged and folded over. But he could tell instantly that this boy was not the source of the telepathic message, and his eyes narrowed. Somewhere close by must be the one who sent it. Moving in that direction, he held up a hand, paused, and then said, "Pain."

A strained gasp came from just beyond the opening, and Ashmadia's face pulled into a grin. They thought to trick him, but …

Wait …

His head turned as he passed Kid Flash.

Something …

Forgetting momentarily about the telepathic interloper, he gripped the boy by the throat. "You know of Jinx!"

At that point there were three or four red, scaled faces dancing in Wally's vision, but through the haze of pain he understood clearly what the thing said. "You … stay away … from Jinx."

"You will tell me." His other hand came up, an ebony claw puncturing the skin just below Wally's left eye. "Where is Jinx?"

But a ragged scream from the back of the courtroom pulled his attention that way …

#

Jinx jerked and dropped a few centimeters when Raven folded over and began to fall. She zipped down and caught the empath under her arms, easing her to the rubble field on the third level. "Raven!" she hissed, "what's wrong?"

The empath didn't have the luxury at the moment of wondering why Jinx wasn't dead. Through the screaming agony, Raven ground out, "Demon … up there … Karau …"

With a gasped, "Wally!" Jinx streaked back up to the opening …

#

Volo was rolling around on the close-pile carpeting beside the bench, holding his head. But his screams soon cut off as his left ear erupted in a gout of blood. A deinonychus suddenly stood there, and with one quick motion, three ten-centimeter-long talons finished the job of dispatching the erstwhile shaman.

The possessed former gang leader sagged and seemed to shrink. His connection with the Underworld had broken!

Screaming in rage, Ashmadia unleashed a bolt of black fire at the dinosaur … but it was no longer there. Turning his anger on the boy in his grip, he drew back a clawed hand, intent on removing the hero's throat …

"You leave him alone!" cried Jinx, as a massive hex bolt struck the being in the face. Ashmadia released Wally as he tried to deal with the tremendously disorienting energies.

Suddenly the pain that had been crippling the Titans eased and drained away. They lay there, gasping, trying to clear their minds.

The red-scaled thing had staggered back, but quickly shook its head and shrugged off the effects of the blast. Grinning ferociously, it leaped at Jinx …

#

Raven, who had only been under the effects of the pain for a few seconds and whose iron control of her emotions lent her aid in overcoming such things, immediately sent a message to Jinx: _The gem … aim for the gem … destroy the gem … the gem …_

The hex-caster, meanwhile, had simply flown backwards, away from the opening, and the possessed being couldn't reach her without falling. But Ashmadia pointed at her and said, "Pain!"

#

_(Note: elapsed time for the following exchange was 0.001 720 seconds.)_

_[ [ __information__: remote activation of pain centers in brain being attempted ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: that bastard is trying to hurt Jinx ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: well we can't let that happen, now can we? ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: initiate pain center override ] ]_

#

There was a brief twinge of discomfort, but then a cool, refreshing tingling filled Jinx's body. She grinned at the demonic thing. "Hey, Chuckles, is that the best you can do?"

Staring in utter bewilderment, Ashmadia tried again. "Blind!"

This time there was no detectable lag between the attack and Kate's parry. Jinx pointed at him and said, "Ugly! Hey, look, I can do it, too, and it _works_ for me!"

With a frustrated howl, the creature began throwing bolts of black fire at her, but she dodged each one easily. Then Raven's message impressed itself on her mind, she focused on the amulet that now seemed attached to his chest, and a bright pink glow sprang into being.

#

_(Note: elapsed time for the following exchange was 0.001 250 seconds … Kate is getting better at this)_

_[ [ _comment_: was that Raven? ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: it sounded like her ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: per direction from Raven, the gem in the amulet may be the source of the demon's power ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: analyze the gem ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: the gem is not a crystal, but instead is a construct of human blood and an unknown but probably extra-dimensional substance in an energy lattice ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: we should attack the lattice ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: agreed ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: formulate a counter for the artificial crystal's specific harmonic pattern ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: energy pattern identified ] ]_

#

The hex blast that hit Ashmadia in the chest wasn't pink; it was almost chartreuse, and that surprised Jinx. Bewildered, she looked at her hand, then back at the demon-thing.

He was caught in some sort of vibrating fit, standing with his arms outstretched, his fists clenched. Brilliant yellow sparks were flying off the amulet. The gem pulsed, glowing an angry red, then swelled, then disintegrated with a loud pop; dark red goo dribbled down the front of his shirt. There seemed to be a sudden overpressure as the demon's essence was pushed out; a prolonged howl reverberated around the chamber, and what once had been Enrico Nuñez swayed forward and pitched over to fall onto the cracked terrazzo below.

Jinx zoomed into the room and landed beside Kid Flash. "Wally! Are you …"

A spray of bullets hit her in the shoulder and head, but were quickly cut off by Violet's force field, which surrounded the remaining gunmen, swept them into a tight ball, and shrank instantly to nothing.

Cyborg sat up and stared at Jinx, working his mouth dumbly.

Beast Boy morphed into his human form and took a few steps in her direction. "But … you're dead."

Wally got to his feet and offered Jinx a hand, which she took, rising gracefully. He asked, "What does he mean by 'dead'?"

She gave him a sheepish grin. "It's complicated."

Robin and Violet stared at the obviously not-dead ex-villain, then looked at each other, then back at Jinx. Violet said, "I told you not to count her out."

Robin asked, "Okay, Jinx, I'll bite. How'd you pull that off?"

Beast Boy poked her arm and looked at Kid Flash. "Is she a zombie?"

"Zombie? What the hell?"

" 'cause if she is, we need to make sure she has a steady supply of brains."

Raven, who had just floated up to the opening, countered, "Are you offering her yours? She should be pleased. They are after all essentially unused."

Starfire didn't say anything but, "Eeeeeee!" as she caught Jinx in a crushing hug and spun her around several times. Fortunately, the suit kept the hug from doing any real damage.

"No, seriously," continued Wally, pulling her from Starfire's grip, "what's with this 'dead' stuff? What are they talking about? What happened to you?"

Brushing off her backside, Jinx said, "Shouldn't we be, oh, I dunno, tending to the hostages instead of dissecting what happened to me?" At this comment, the rest of the heroes, somewhat chagrined, agreed, and got busy doing just that.

Robin did slide by her at one point and say, "We're going to talk about this later. A lot."

She chuckled and shook her head. "Whatever."

#

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**A/N: Okay, what do you all think of Kate? I'd like to know.**

**One more chapter to go!**

**Read and Review, please!**

**Concolor44**


	16. Confirmed

**Bespoke**

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_Disclaimer:_

_Don't own Titans. Don't own Incredibles. Just here for the beer, as long as it's on tap and not any of that IPA swill._

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**Chapter Sixeen**

_* * Sunday 23 August, 7:50amCST * *_

Dr. Adam Wattersen was enjoying his first cup of coffee while working on the Sunday Sudoku when a knock came at his door. Frowning, he glanced at the clock and then trotted into his foyer.

The men on the porch didn't leave him with any warm feelings. Dressed in identical black suits, the three were of a type: tall, broad and humorless. Leaving his chain fastened, he opened the door a crack. "Can I help you?"

"Adam Wattersen?"

"Who wants to know?"

The man in front retrieved a badge from his coat and presented it. "I'm Special Agent duQuesne with the FBI. We would like a few minutes of your time."

Adam frowned more deeply. "The FBI?"

"Yes, sir. May we come in?"

"… Are you sure you have the right house?"

"Yes, sir."

"… Uh … sure, I guess." He opened the door.

The taser hit him in the neck. A few agonizing seconds later, he lost consciousness.

'Agent duQuesne' spoke into a lapel mike. "Target secure. Bring the van around back." To the other two, he said, "We have twenty minutes. Find the rest of the suits and all his research. Then burn the house."

##

_* * 9:10amCST * *_

"I've got the feed goin'."

The other teen heroes in the room all looked over at Cyborg. A few of them moved in his direction. Robin asked, "You cover all the wire services?"

"Duh. Okay, here goes. Chicago Tribune: TITANS VICTORIOUS!"

Beast Boy offered, "As much trouble as they have with gangs, I wouldn't expect 'em to be all gloomy an' shit."

"L.A. Times says, GANG INFILTRATION HITS MIDWEST. The San Francisco Chronicle just says, ROUND ONE TO THE TITANS."

Kid Flash nodded. "That's what I said. It's just the first round."

"Maybe so, Wally," put in Robin, "but it was a very telling round."

"Yeah. One of us died."

Jinx poked him in the ribs with an elbow. "The rumors of my death were greatly exaggerated."

Rubbing his side, he gave her a wink and then pulled her up next to him. She didn't resist. Much.

"Okay … New York Times says, GANG LOSES BATTLE. Yeah, no shit, Sherlock. Um … Atlanta Journal Constitution says, TITANS CRUSH GANG. The Washington Post says, GANG DEATHS SKYROCKET. The sub-heading reads, TITANS' EXTREME RESPONSE TOO MUCH?"

Robin snorted. "What else would you expect that rag to say? We never do _**anything**_ right according to them."

Starfire leaned over and asked, "What does the Keystone City Monitor say about us?"

"Uhhh … hm. HEROES TRIUMPHANT! With four exclamation points."

Beast Boy said, "Shouldn't Raven be seeing these, too?"

"I was just over by her room," answered Robin, "and she said she still needed to meditate. She'll show up when she's ready."

The shape shifter gave an exaggerated sigh. "She always says that!"

"Maybe because it's always true."

#

Raven hovered, legs crossed, some ten centimeters above the coverlet on her bed. Had anyone been foolish enough to enter the room, that person would have been privy to a very odd conversation.

"I know you enjoyed it, but don't get used to it."

**AGAIN! I WOULD DO IT AGAIN!**

"You know very well why you can't be out and active all the time."

**I WANT MORE!**

"Yes, I know. That is why I fed you earlier."

**MORE OF THEM! GIVE ME MORE!**

"All in good time, Rage. Please believe me when I tell you that the supply of utterly deserving scum isn't going to dry up in _**my**_ lifetime."

**I NEED THEM!  
MORE LIKE THE TWO YOU GAVE ME!  
THEY WERE PERFECT!**

"Weren't they just? But for now you must wait."

**DON'T WANT TO WAIT!**

"Yes, you are quite the impatient little thing, aren't you? But you've consumed two souls in the last day, and that is going to have to do you until we can get back to Jump City."

**DON'T DENY ME!**

"I'm not denying you, as you are well aware. Perhaps you will get lucky and some thug will attack us." Raven almost smiled to herself. "That would be justice of the most poetic sort, don't you think?"

**I MUST HAVE FOOD!**

"And you shall. But not at the moment. Now … go to sleep like a good girl."

There was a short struggle, but the outcome was never in doubt. Then Raven closed her eyes and began a low, slow chant of her mantra. However, the light leaking from under her eyelids had a distinctly reddish tinge to it.

#

"… and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the Seattle Times used the UPI story and the same headline. … Um … Hey, here's one from The Scotsman."

"Where's that from?" asked Beast Boy.

"… um … Scotland? That's why it's called the _**Scotsman**_, doofus."

"Whoa! All the way across the pond! Cool!"

"Hmh. It says, GUNS NO MATCH FOR SUPER POWERS." He scanned the article briefly. "Well, it's not exactly our cheering section, but it ain't a chop piece either."

"We'll take what we can get," said Robin.

A brisk knock on the hotel room door brought most of their heads around. Starfire zipped over and flung it open to reveal a figure familiar to them all: Green Lantern. Those Titans who weren't already standing did so. Starfire (who was dealing with a tiny bit of hero-worship) said, "Oh! Mr. Jor … ah … that is, Green Lantern! Please, come in!"

Beast Boy yelled, "Awesome! Ya got back!"

Robin came over and shook his hand. "Boy, am I glad to see you!"

"I'm just sorry we weren't here for the action. That was a hell of a load to dump on you guys."

Cyborg muttered, "We've handled worse."

Green Lantern smirked a bit. "Yeah, I guess you have. But if you're referring to the incident I think you are, you didn't have to worry about the press with that one."

Jinx made a rude noise. That pulled a chuckle from their visitor, who continued, "Yeah, they haven't been very kind to _**you**_, have they?"

Kid Flash answered, "Not so's you'd notice, no. They pick on her somethin' awful."

"But the cops are nice," she countered, "an' I don't so much care about what a bunch of glory-grubbing pencil-neck paparazzi say about me." Pausing, she continued, rather more soberly, "Hell, for all that, I can't deny that at least _**some**_ of it's true. Or was at one time, anyhow."

Hal Jordan studied the girl for a moment, noting the possessive way Kid Flash had his arm around her waist. Then he examined her attire. "This is the suit?"

She pulled away from Wally and twirled for him. "It is."

"I'd been hearing rumors that you had a new costume … and that it was quite a bit more than just a costume."

"You heard right. It's … um … yeah, it's a lot more than a costume." She giggled and added, "Got a mind of its own. Literally."

"Uh-huh. Well, if you don't mind, I'd like to talk with you about it later."

"Good luck with that," Robin put it, disgustedly. "I tried to get straight answers out of her last night, and …"

"And _**you**_," interrupted Jinx, "didn't ask the right questions. I told you: it's complicated."

"Yeah, you said that a lot."

"And," interjected Green Lantern, "that's not why I'm here." He made sure he had everyone's attention. "We need to schedule a debriefing with the League. Gang activity seems to be ramping up world-wide, they're using more sophisticated tactics and _**vastly**_ more potent weapons, and we need information."

"Oh!" said Robin and Cyborg together, then glanced at each other and grinned. "Yeah, that would be a good idea. That gang is a _**long**_ way from down and out."

"True. And then we need to get each of you some counseling."

"Counseling?" came a chorus of voices. "What for?"

Looking at each of them in turn, he said, "None of you ever had to kill anyone before."

Suddenly no one was meeting his eyes.

He nodded. "It doesn't matter if you're human, metahuman, alien, or whatever. Taking another sentient life is a wrenching experience, especially the first time. Now, I can see that you are all _**apparently**_ doing well, emotionally. But killing is the most common cause of PTSD, and it's even more intense if _**you**_ were the one doing the killing." He paused for effect. "All of us in the League have been put in similar situations from time to time. Sometimes we were able to turn the events around so that life was preserved. But sometimes it was necessary to take life to prevent an even worse tragedy. And when that happened, we all went through counseling."

Robin frowned. "Wait … wait just a minute. Are you telling me that Batman has … has _**killed**_ someone?"

Earnestly did Green Lantern regard that incredulous countenance. After a few breaths he gave a single nod. "It wasn't his choice. He didn't want to. But that was the way it had to be."

"How come _**he**_ never said anything?"

"An interesting question. Just as you faced an impossible dilemma yesterday, so did he. But I think that he should be the one to give you the details … if you want them."

Robin, totally lost in thought, turned away and wandered toward the window.

Starfire asked, "When will the debriefing take place?"

"We'd like to start this afternoon, if possible. I can get you all up to the Watchtower with no trouble."

Cyborg had suspected that was why this particular Leaguer had shown up. "So … after lunch?"

"Or we can have lunch there if you like. We have a gourmet chef on staff."

Vic barked a laugh. "Of course ya do."

Beast Boy asked, "How's he do with vegan food?"

"You're vegan, I take it?"

"Yep."

"Hm. I can't say. But he does extremely well with everything I've tasted, and that included quite a few vegetable-based dishes. I'm sure he'd make anything you asked for."

"Sweet! Dude, do I need to bring my own tofu?"

"Ah … no. I feel certain he already has some. Several varieties unless I miss my guess badly." He glanced around and frowned. "Where is Raven?"

"Meditating," answered Robin over his shoulder absently. "Said she needed it after all that action."

"Oh. That's understandable. But she'll need to come along, too."

"I'll go get her!" volunteered Beast Boy. "Be right back." He zipped out the door, and the others could then hear something four-footed racing away down the hall.

Turning again to Robin, Green Lantern asked, "What about the extra-dimensional members of your team?"

"You mean Violet and Edna. I'd guess they're over at Edna's place in the Idlewild community. She has a large facility there, complete with a super-suit-making lab."

Jinx offered, "That's where we've been staying."

"Yeah," added Kid Flash, "because the gang demolished my apartment building."

Green Lantern raised an eyebrow. "… 'we', is it?"

"… Um …"

"… Jinx and you are … living together?"

Both of them blushed furiously. Wally began stammering. Jinx cut him off and said, "It ain't really like that."

"Then what _**is**_ it like?"

"We're just … sort of … sharing," offered Wally. It sounded lame, even to him.

A snort came from Cyborg's direction. "Sharin' personal space, that is."

"Victor Stone!" said Jinx in flabbergasted surprise, "You … you …"

"Now, look," retorted Hal, "I realize the age of consent is sixteen, but you're both still technically minors and …"

"We're not doin' anything wrong!" insisted Jinx. "And I should know!"

From behind Green Lantern came a monotone, "She's telling the truth."

They all turned or craned their necks to see Raven where she had apparently phased up through the floor. She gave them a steady stare and then added, "There are possibly seven people on Earth who can shield their emotions from me effectively, and Jinx is definitely not numbered among them. She wears _**her**_ emotions like a stripper wears a feather boa. Trust me, if she and Kid Flash were copulating, I'd be able to tell."

"Raven!" screeched the pink-haired girl, her face almost giving off smoke.

"Oh, please. I'm just saving you some aggravation and us some time." Addressing Green Lantern, she said, "I am ready for the debriefing now, if that is your wish."

Beast Boy came bouncing back into the group. "She wasn't in her … oh, hey, Rae!"

Her fierce glare sent him scurrying around behind Cyborg. Green Lantern, fighting down a grin, looked around at the rest of the teen heroes, all gazing at him in various degrees of expectation, and gave a small nod. "No time like the present, then." And they all trooped up to the roof.

##

_* * 6:15pmCST * *_

"Are you comfortable?"

Jinx looked askance at the maze of wires that led from her to the bank of equipment many meters away at one side of the chamber. "I guess so. Kate? How 'bout you?"

[I do not detect any imminent dangers, so I suppose everything is acceptable for now.]

She gave the operator, who happened to be J'onn J'onzz, a thumbs-up. "Go for it."

"Good. The first test will be measuring your focus."

A large robot lumbered into the test chamber.

[Okay, girls, **now** we're pickin' up some o' that imminent danger!]

"Jinx, the robot will attack momentarily. I would like for you to disable it without causing any obvious damage to its surface. Can you do that?"

"I guess we'll see, won't we?"

The robot turned to face her and took a step, bringing up one arm in her direction.

_[ [ ACTION: analyze weapons platform for primary threat ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: use of cranial-based turret lasers 73% probability ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: use of shoulder-mounted particle-beam emitter 41% probability ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: K.A.T.E. is currently configured to negate effects of particle-beam and lased weapons of less than 5.7 terajoules ] ]_

_[ [ information: no currently-available mobile energy-weapon platform of Earth origin is capable of producing more than 2.3 terajoules ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: Bring it, bitch! ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: use of arm-mounted rail gun 55% probability ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: Damn, I hate rail guns! ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: You and me both! ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: use of hip-mounted RPGs 39% probability ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: analysis of weapons platform indicates targeting system vulnerability ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: direct-contact kinetic attack 18% probability ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: analysis of mass and probable speed of weapons platform indicates an inability to harm K.A.T.E. via kinetic methods ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: determine an efficient method for disabling targeting system ] ]_

_[ [ status: available methods codified ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: the most effective method will also disable platform motivators ] ]_

_[ [ ACTION: disable targeting system ] ]_

_[ [ __information__: elapsed time for analysis and decision tree formulation = 0.020 807 seconds ] ]_

_[ [ _comment_: Girls, you totally rock! ] ]_

Before the robot could take a second step, Jinx hit it with a blazing beam of pink energy that wrapped around it half a dozen times and then sank in. The mechanism shuddered to a stop, the various lights died, and it slumped, inert.

Batman, who was standing behind J'onn and watching the test, muttered, "Damnation."

J'onn was too stunned at first to respond, but finally leaned over to the microphone and said, "That … was very good, Jinx. Thank you. Please wait for the next test." He shut off the mike and looked blankly up at Batman. "I did not expect her to be able to do that."

The caped hero pointed at a readout and asked, "Is that decimal in the right place?"

"This was supposed to put her in a stressful situation."

"J'onn, is this …"

"It should have been impervious. That was its design."

Batman tapped his shoulder. "J'onn!"

The Martian started and looked back at his companion. "Hm?"

He tapped the readout. "Is this calibrated correctly?"

A few tense seconds passed before J'onn confirmed that for him. "Yes. That hex bolt … nearly exceeded the system's capability to measure it. The robot was supposed to be shielded against all know forms of … it should have taken her several tries, and even then she would have needed to … but she didn't … and she just … tossed it off. Almost casually."

"We need to talk to this 'Dr. Wattersen' that she and Kid Flash mentioned."

"I'll send someone to get him. But according to Jinx, the suit is vastly more powerful now than it was when he gave it to her."

"Yes, so I heard. A consequence of its constant exposure to her probability field, and then the stress brought on by her narrow squeak with death. Nevertheless, if it can be done once, it can be replicated. That sort of tech should be kept out of the wrong hands."

"Agreed." J'onn pulled out his communicator.

##

_* * Monday 24 August, 8:00amCST * *_

Robin was used to being the first or second one up at the Tower, depending on whether Raven had actually been to sleep or had simply spent most of the night meditating. Typically rolling out of bed at 0500 hours, he would have his shower and an early pre-breakfast done and be reading the morning paper with his third cup of coffee by 0545. So it was no surprise that he volunteered for the first time slot in the counseling schedule.

His nose hovering over the hot, black liquid currently in his cup, he took several long breaths and then sighed. "I can see we'll have to switch brands. Can we get this in Jump City?"

Black Canary gave him a nod. "You should be able to. But if you can't find it, they do mail order. I can get you all the information you need."

"Fantastic." He took an appreciative sip and sighed again. "Heaven."

"Do you have a good grinder?"

"Cyborg does. It's an attachment for his left arm.

She had to laugh at that. "I'll bet."

"So … You want to get started?"

"Sure. And please understand that this is exactly like being in a psychiatrist's office. What gets said here, stays here."

"Thanks."

"You seem a lot more at ease than I'd have thought under the circumstances. Would you like to tell me about the assault?"

He put the cup down and leaned back in the chair, placed his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. "I didn't want to do it that way."

"What way?"

"The killing. Bruce has always been adamant that heroes don't kill; that they would sacrifice their own lives before taking another's, or allowing someone else to kill."

"Ah. Yes, he's pretty strict about that. We get lectures about responsibility from time to time."

"Hm. I'm sure I've heard that lecture more than once."

"I'm sure you have."

"So, no, I didn't want to have to kill anybody. But this time it wasn't about what I wanted. The gangbangers were chopping people up. They had a couple dozen hostages, and had already cut off the Mayor's finger and the Chief of Police's foot. They were … going to kill everyone. If we didn't give in to their demands, they intended to keep whacking away at those poor people."

"They demanded that you give them Jinx?"

"Yeah. That. And a few other things, but nothing else major."

"And they never said why they wanted Jinx?"

"We've got lots of theories, but no hard facts. We know that a few of the gang escaped through the water system under City Hall …"

"Right."

"… but the rest of them died. Nearly a hundred."

"One hundred and eighteen was the final tally."

He stared at her and then dropped his eyes. "Damn."

"It's hard to deal with, I know." She shifted and leaned forward. "But talking about it is just the first step. This isn't like just standing around and giving out passes to the afterlife, as if they were movie tickets."

"Don't I know it. Those guys were all just about as evil as they come. I don't have any illusions about where we sent them when they died."

She studied him for a moment. "Your file has your religious preference listed as 'Christian – other'. What does that mean to you?"

Several seconds went by while he tied up the loose ends of his response. "It means I believe there is a Supreme Being who, at the very least, put things in motion in this reality, and probably in all of the others as well. It means I believe in an afterlife, that we are not just biological units who cease to exist when we die; we have souls, if you will, a non-corporeal part that goes on after the body quits working. It means that the example Christ left us is one we should try to emulate, and I do my best to live according to those precepts." He chuckled drily. "Vic and I've had a few conversations along those lines. His take on religion is a bit more free-form than mine." Clearing his throat, he picked up the coffee cup and took a long swallow. "Oh, yeah. They'll be serving this stuff in Heaven." He took a few more sips, finally draining the cup. "I think that … okay, let's get one thing out of the way up front. There's no secret handshake that proves you're a Christian. There's no Christian version of a civil service exam, nothing that you can point to that proves to everyone that you are, in fact, a Christian. And I think there are a lot of people who take advantage of that fact, who call themselves Christians when they don't have a clue what it really means."

"And what _**does**_ it mean?"

"I'm still working on that." A chuckle escaped. "Hey, I'm not even eighteen. According to most of what I've read, I'm not _**supposed**_ to have anything figured out yet."

Stifling a smirk, she said, "A remarkably mature viewpoint. I'll have to congratulate Bruce the next time I see him."

"Ha-ha. Really, though, what it boils down to is that being a Christian is more about _**who**_ you know than _**what**_ you know. My folks were Catholic, sort of. Mom was Romany and Dad's mother was, too, though Dad's dad was _gajo_, an outsider of some kind, which is how we ended up as 'Grayson' instead of Deszó. We'd go to Mass now and then, if there was a church handy. Being in the circus, though …"

"I get it."

"We never really talked about it much, you know? Religion and personal faith and stuff? It was mostly just something that we all assumed, and the Church was how you approached God, and … and then they …" He drew a long breath and centered himself. "They, ah … they were … killed." There was a long pause. "I was ten." The small table between them received a penetrating stare for a few moments. "I'm not sure I'll ever really get over that."

"No one would expect you to. I certainly don't."

"Most days I can think around it. You know? Stay active. Stay busy. Keep myself occupied with fighting crime. That way it … it stays … numb. Most of the time. But … it's been close to eight years. And it's still really clear."

"It was a defining event in your life. I'd be very surprised if it _**weren't**_ clear."

"So … having that as a base to work from, you can see why I'd want to avoid killing in general." He caught her eye and then returned his stare to the table. "And then … training with Bruce … it just … reinforced my aversion to killing."

"I can see that."

"But Raven, and then Starfire, made the case for using, ah, 'extreme prejudice' against the gangsters, and try as I might, I couldn't see any way out of it. We had an insanely tight deadline – like, _**right now**_, you know? – that we couldn't ignore. We had to save those people. It wasn't just about us. We had to conduct that operation as if we were in a war. Because we were. And there wasn't anyone else around who could do the job. The SWAT team had already lost two men to snipers, and hadn't penetrated any of the buildings."

"You did what you had to do. And all those people you saved are eternally grateful."

"… Yeah. I know. But …"

"… but?"

"It's just … hard. I tried not to look at them too closely. To pretend they were practice dummies or training robots or … yeah."

"… But?"

"But robots don't bleed."

"No. No, they don't."

"Still …" He leaned back in the chair again, eyes distant. "Still, while the assault was going on, it was all too easy to just fall into tactical mode. Plan the attack, execute the attack, press the advantage, plan the next attack. It occupied my mind fully."

"The same thing happens to soldiers during battle. Being shot at tends to bring a very high level of focus to the mind."

"Ma'am, you said a mouthful …"

##

_* * 8:50amCST * *_

"I tell you, Hal, he's one of the most firmly-grounded young men I've ever met. If Bruce doesn't swell up with pride until he absolutely _**floats**_ … he's an idiot."

"Yeah, I'd like to be a fly on the wall when you tell him that."

"Hm. No, don't see that happening."

"So you think he'll be okay?"

"I'm sure of it." Black Canary had been pacing slowly across the room, but swung around and took a seat. "He's already working through all the crap he'll have to deal with, and he's going about it exactly right. Plus, he's almost _**scary**_ smart …"

"Like his mentor."

"Ha. Yeah. And he's one hundred percent committed to the cause. He knows that he won't be as effective a leader until he comes to grips with the fallout, and he's taking all the right steps. It's really quite uplifting to talk to him."

"Got a little crush goin' there, Ms. Cougar?"

"Stuff it, Hal. Just because _**you**_ can't recognize and admire …"

"Hey, hey! Chill. No worries. I take it back."

"Wise."

"So who's next?"

"I thought I'd talk with Beast Boy."

##

_* * 9:00amCST * *_

She looked at him incredulously. "What did you say?"

"Well … it was fun."

"Fun."

"See, here's the thing. I never get to cut loose. Ever. Robin can hit as hard as he wants and fight until he's exhausted and put everything into it. Raven can use her magic until she uses it up, until she's completely drained. Cyborg can hit things as hard as he wants, too, most of the time, and his sonic cannon thingy, even on full power, isn't gonna be fatal to much of anybody. Starfire … yeah, well, okay, maybe she does keep a tight leash on things, too. I never saw her melt half a ton o' super-alloy into slag before. But _just about every time_ I transform, I have to watch myself. See, I can get up-close-and-personal by being small and maneuverable and a hard target; then I can change into something big and powerful where it'll do the most good. But we've never killed before."

"True. But how does that …"

"Think about it! Let's say we're goin' up against a mob o' bank robbers. I can zip in as a fly and drop in between 'em and then morph to a grizzly." He leaned forward. "Do you know what grizzlies are really, really good at?"

"Scaring the piss out of bank robbers?"

He laughed a bit. "Yeah, that, too. But I mean real ones. Grizzlies in the wild." He stood up. "Lemme show ya something."

He morphed into a grizzly, standing on all fours. Its face was less than a meter from hers, and where she sat on the couch, she had to look up slightly to meet its eyes. The presence of the enormous beast filled the room and left her with a large measure of unquiet.

Beast Boy held up a paw and turned it sideways so she could get a good look at the claws. They were several centimeters long, thick at the base and tapering to a keen point. He put that foot back on the floor and opened his mouth wide, showcasing an appalling amount of very sharp ivory for her inspection. She didn't feel like getting any closer than she already was.

Then he was a thin, teenage boy again. "You see that? You see those teeth? Those claws?"

"Uh-huh."

"_**Grizzlies kill things!**_ They are totally well-equipped to do so. And I'm supposed to take out the bank robbers without killing them. But if I bite them, they'll die. If I swat them with those claws, they'll die." He sat back down and crossed his arms. "It's not really fair. Humans are fragile. Grizzly versus human only has one outcome. Most of the time, even if the human has a gun, there's only one outcome. I've been shot before. A lot. And you know what happens when you shoot a grizzly?"

"… It gets mad?"

"Yup. Shoot it once, and it gets mad. Shoot it again, and it's _**really**_ pissed off! Do you have any idea how hard it is to rein in that instinct to lash out and kill when you've just been shot twice?"

"Can't say as I do."

"Well I do: it's hard. Really frickin' hard. But I did it because that's what heroes do. But this time …" He got a distant look in his eye and the corners of his mouth crept up. "Yeah. This time I didn't have to hold back."

"So … you say you don't have a problem with having killed a couple dozen people?"

"Oh, no. I didn't say that at all. I'm still sorry it had to go down that way. Like an old adversary of ours once said, if you _kill_ 'em, they'll never learn _anything_."

That pulled a chuckle out of her. "As you say."

"But the thing is, see, that I didn't have to fight against my instincts this time. The grizzly could do what it was designed to do: kill things. Ditto the dinosaurs. Oh, yeah, speakin' of that, the deinonychus is even more vicious and more perfectly adapted to killing than the grizzly is. It's not as durable, though; you can kill it with a gun. But anyway, what I'm sayin' is that it was … well, it was a relief. Not to have to clamp down so hard on what the forms I take are really the best at. So, yeah. In a way, it was fun."

She toyed with a pencil for a few moments while collecting her thoughts. He waited patiently. Finally, she said, "Do you not anticipate that it might bother you a little more as you gain some distance from the events?"

"Oh, probably. I'm _**real**_ sure the others will tell you I'm not the mental heavyweight on the team, though. The way Raven says it, I don't tend to over-think things. But I'm versatile and durable, I can kick some serious ass, and that's good enough for me."

"Uh-huh." And she made notes for a while.

##

_* * 9:46amCST * *_

Batman stopped to watch as Black Canary stomped his way. He could tell she wasn't even seeing him, though. "You should be careful. That thousand-meter stare will have you walking into a wall."

Pulling up sharp at his voice, she turned to face the hero. "Have you ever talked with Beast Boy?"

"Garfield Logan?"

"Yeah."

"… No. Not anything beyond monosyllabic pleasantries a few times. Why?"

"I can't figure him out."

Batman had to work not to crack a grin. "If you can't swim in the shallow end, what makes you …"

"Don't start. He's like the old Soviet Union."

"… Beg pardon?"

"He's a riddle wrapped in an enigma inside a mystery."

"… Garfield Logan?" He held out a hand at shoulder height. "About this tall? Green and skinny? Tells stupid jokes?"

"I _**said**_ don't start! There is _**waaay**_ more to that boy than anyone understands."

"What makes you say that?"

"He's got an amazingly complex relationship with all those animals he carries around inside of him. It's nine kinds of miracle that he isn't stark, raving bonkers."

He merely contemplated her frustrated countenance for a bit.

After a moment she continued, "He's probably the least disturbed by what they went through of any of them. Of course I haven't spoken with Raven or Starfire or Cyborg yet, but I can't see any of them having such a … a … _**lackadaisical**_ attitude about death!"

"Lackadaisical? Beast Boy?"

"Yes! He was dangerously close to flippant, and I really don't think it was an act!"

"Hm." Thinking that over for a minute, he finally said, "We should talk to J'onn about this."

"That's exactly who I was going to see."

"Very well. Come on." And they trooped off down the hall.

##

_* * 10:00amCST * *_

Starfire's lovely face was slightly marred by tear tracks. "I am sorry for being the messed up. It was not my intention."

"That's not a problem, Kori. I'm here to talk to if you need to get something off your chest."

Frowning, the alien girl glanced down at the front of her shirt for a moment. But then she brightened and said, "That is an English saying, yes? A metaphor?"

"Uh … oh, you mean 'get something off your chest'? Yes, it is. It means to unburden yourself, or share with someone else something that is bothering you."

"I see. Very well." She considered what to say for a minute. "I have been speaking with Robin about what he has begun to refer to as 'the late unpleasantness'. By this he means the battle we conducted at City Hall."

"Ah. And that's why you were crying?"

"It was. Yes. Robin is having the upset concerning his involvement."

"Right. I spoke with him earlier you know."

"Yes, you did. He has said that it did the helping of his mind. But he is still very much agitated. The deaths have made him truly sad, and quite possibly disorganized in his mind."

Black Canary had to smile a little at her sentence construction. "And it did the same for you?"

"… I beg your pardon?"

"The deaths. All the carnage having to do with rescuing the hostages. That made you sad, too, didn't it?"

"Me?" She seemed genuinely confused.

"Yes. As Robin was. You've spoken with him, so you know he's dealing with having to kill those gangsters to save the hostages. And even though he knows it was necessary, the killing bothers him. Is that also what you're dealing with?"

"Oh! Why, no. It is not. I am sad for Robin, because he is having such a difficulty in the dealing with his feelings about killing, and I am sad because I helped Raven to convince him that it was necessary."

"… Okay. He'd said something about that."

"Yes! Raven spoke of it first because she had allowed Rage to consume one of the gangsters and then when Robin …"

"Excuse me?"

"… What?"

"Who is Rage?"

"Rage is one of the aspects of Raven's personality. She is what remains of Trigon's influence in Raven's soul."

"I'm sorry … I think I must have missed something in Raven's dossier. An aspect of her personality? What, exactly, does that mean?"

"Ah. I believe I am doing the understanding of your dilemma." She placed her hands primly in her lap. "Raven is a very complex person. She had known almost from birth that a prophecy stated she would become a portal for her father, Trigon, to gain access to our universe. This was very heavy knowledge for her. Raised, as she was, by the monks in Azarath, she practiced the controlling of her emotions her entire life. If she allowed herself to feel anything too deeply, it could release the demonic side of her soul and bring about the destruction of Earth."

"Uh … right. Okay, I knew … some of that already. She really must be a remarkable individual to be able to bear up under such a burden."

"Truly, you have no idea."

"But … what does that have to do with this 'Rage' you mentioned?"

"Oh, I see." She frowned at nothing for a moment, then stated, "In a bid to aid her in her quest to maintain the iron control of herself at all times, Raven has divided her personality into different aspects. You might think of them as avatars, except that they all reside in Nevermore and are not allowed to take physical form in our reality."

"I'm sorry? What's Nevermore?"

"Her mind. It is … a physical plane of existence. I have been there."

"… Okay, now you've lost me."

"Perhaps you should get Raven to explain it to you. Or even take you there."

"Take me where? Into her mind?"

"Yes."

"This has got to be one of the strangest conversations I've had in a long time."

"I am sorry for the confusion, if it is in any way my fault."

Shaking her head, Black Canary brought herself back to the topic at hand. "So this 'Rage' … you said 'consumed a gangster', right?"

"Yes."

"How?"

"She brought him into Nevermore and then I suppose she gave him to Rage."

A few vague blinks were her only response for a minute. "Oooookay. We'll let that lie. I think my session with Raven is going to be very enlightening."

"That is the likely."

"So Raven started the ball rolling and you jumped in?"

"What? Oh! Yes. Yes, I did. Raven and I did the convincing of him that it would not be possible to rescue the hostages without loss of life. Once he was sure of this, he began to formulate the excellent plans that we used. And until that demon showed up, they were completely successful, except for Jinx getting killed. But if she had followed Robin's orders, she would have remained not-shot."

"Oh, really? I got the impression that she got caught in a trap."

"A trap it surely was, but Jinx did not stay with the group. She was doing the trusting of her suit and imagined that she was proof against bullets. But the rail gun does not use bullets, it uses large needles, and they are sharp and they go very much faster than bullets. If she had stayed with us as a group, she would have been safe and we would have destroyed the gun without her being killed."

It took a few moments to absorb all that. "I see."

Starfire smiled brightly. "Glorious!"

"So … you and Raven convinced him to conduct the raid as an exercise in warfare … and that's why _**you**_ are upset? Not because of how you, personally, feel about the killing?"

"Oh, X'hal, no! Those men were the terribly evil. As Victor said, they needed killing."

"Victor said that, did he?"

"Yes, at two points during the battle if I recall correctly."

"And you feel that way, too?"

Starfire took her time in formulating her answer. "When Mr. Jordan came to see us yesterday morning, there was one time where he made a statement about killing, and something he called 'PTSD'. I did not know what that was, but Robin explained it later."

"Right. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. They used to call it shell-shock. It's a condition that happens to a lot of people who have been through extreme violence."

"Yes, that is what Robin said. And Mr. Jordan said that it did not matter who we were, we all had to deal with this PTSD. But this is not correct."

"… No?"

"No." She seemed very confident now. "Tamaraneans do not fall prey to this PTSD."

"What, as a race?"

"Correct. If I were subject to PTSD, I would not have survived to join the Titans in the first place."

"… How's that again?" _I can see I'll have to update a __**few**__ dossiers!_

"I was a captive of a very cruel race. They made me a slave, beat me savagely, and used me for the most depraved sexual acts that you could imagine. After that I was given to the Psions for them to experiment on. They tortured me horribly. I had … um … just recently escaped from them when I met Robin. I was afforded the opportunity later to exact some revenge on some of those who had mistreated me. Doing so was necessary." She leaned forward to emphasize her point. "Killing the gangsters was necessary. I have never really had the good understanding of why such horrible, violent, worthless men are placed in a prison when a much more practical solution would be to kill them. They will never become good. They will never be anything but a menace to other humans. And yet you refrain from killing them. This I truly do not understand. Tamaraneans do not share this deficiency. Perhaps it is as Raven says, and humans have a deep-seated tendency toward self-destruction."

Black Canary stared at Starfire's earnest face for a short time before saying, "Remind me not to get on your bad side."

A smirk preceded, "You are not the first one to say that."

"Hm. I'm sure." Clearing her throat, she continued, "Okay, then, let's talk about how you can help Robin, since that seems to be the main …"

Superman's voice over the intercom interrupted her. "All League members assemble in Hall B. This is a General Alarm. All League members assemble immediately in Hall B."

Casting a quick look at the young alien, the hero said, "Guess we'll have to pick this up later."

#

_* * 10:25amCST * *_

Most of the standard roster of League heroes were present when Superman took the podium. The teens all clustered in a knot at the back of the room.

He began without preamble. "Last evening, J'onn J'onzz put Jinx through a battery of tests to explore the various abilities of her new super-suit. The results were nothing short of stunning."

Jinx jerked in shock and turned to Kid Flash. "He didn't tell me that!" she hissed under her breath.

"No," answered Superman, who had of course heard her, "he didn't. There was a great deal of data to examine, and you seem supremely well adapted to your suit already. We didn't feel it necessary to alarm you."

"Oh. Well …" She glanced around nervously at the heroes, practically all of them staring right back at her. "It's not so much me that did the adapting. It's Kate."

"Kate?"

"My suit."

With a distinctly amused tone in his voice, the Flash said, "You named your suit?"

"She named herself. K.A.T.E. is an acronym for Kinetically Adaptive Tactical Exoskelton. She came up with it."

Someone – Jinx thought it might have been Zatanna – exclaimed, "The **_suit_ **came up with it?"

"Yeah," chimed in Wally. "The suit's really smart."

Nodding in agreement, Superman said, "You'd mentioned that the embedded AI had become very advanced."

"She's got eleven distinct personality analogs," confirmed Jinx. "They argue sometimes."

A few low chuckles and giggles echoed in the large room.

"Be that as it may," continued Superman, "we currently have a major situation brewing, and it centers around that suit." He stabbed at a control on the lectern, and a holographic rendering of a residential neighborhood appeared in front of him. Firemen were attempting to extinguish a house fire, but it looked as if they had been too late. "This is a satellite recording. Yesterday morning, Dr. Adam Wattersen's house was burned."

Both Wally and Jinx yelled, "What?"

"It was an obvious arson job. The perpetrator didn't bother to hide his work. From Jinx's earlier …"

"Is he okay?" Jinx wanted to know.

"I'll get to that. From Jinx's earlier information, we know that Dr. Wattersen had several versions of the suit in his home. A very thorough investigation was made of the fire, beginning last night when these events were discovered. There was nothing in the house connected with his research into the suits. Nothing at all. We had intended to get the doctor up here to the Watchtower, but it seems someone else beat us to the punch."

Her heart beating so hard she could barely breath, Jinx asked again, "Is he … okay?"

"We don't know." He fiddled with the controls and a different holograph popped up. It was somewhat grainier than the first, but they could all make out two men, dressed in black suits, carrying a limp form out to a van. "We believe that is Dr. Wattersen. That's his house, and this video was taken early yesterday morning."

"… How in the hell do you just _**happen**_ to have video of him bein' kidnapped! ?"

Overlooking her outburst, he said, "This was incidental. Keystone City has four geosynchronous satellites monitoring the place most of the time. They keep three of them focused on crime hotspots, and let one take random video of various sectors. That's how we secured this scene. It was just lucky for us."

_Or maybe **unlucky** for the kidnappers!_ was the thought that ran through Jinx's head. "So do we know where they went?"

"No. That's why we are meeting now. I'm mobilizing the League to locate Dr. Wattersen and to destroy any of his suits you happen across. These are the coordinates that I want each of you to use …"

Jinx tuned him out. She knew good and well that Superman wouldn't let her – or any of the teen heroes, most likely – participate in what was certainly a Justice League-only exercise. Concentrating, she thought, _Kate? You there?_

_[Of course, sweetie! And I heard everything. What's your plan?]_

_We're gonna see just how much you've improved on my ability to manipulate probability, that's what!_

_[I'm up for that. We very likely don't have a lot of time. Once they get what they want from Father, they'll kill him.]_

_Then we'd best get started, don't you think?_

_[I do. How do you propose we get back to Earth?]_

_I think we ought to include Raven in this little jaunt. She'd be just the sort of balance we'll need._

_[An excellent suggestion! Let us proceed.]_

##

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. . .

. . .

Author's Notes: I realize that it doesn't look like it, but this is the Official End of 'Bespoke'. However, there will be a sequel. Probably more than one. My Muse is already galloping around, frantically lassoing plot bunnies and tossing them into a handy corral. So fear not. We will find out what happened to the good doctor, and what additional abilities, if any (yeah, right), that K.A.T.E. might come up with for Our Lovely Heroine.

Thank you all for reading, and for your kind comments! If you have any further questions … save 'em. They'll be answered in the next story: 'Heterodyne'.

Happy Reading!

Concolor44


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